


fear will bring you to me (love will bring us together)

by Nightly_Refrain



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: AU - no List, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Canonical Minor Character Death, F/M, Soulmates, yes island
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-24
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:21:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 27,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23974411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nightly_Refrain/pseuds/Nightly_Refrain
Summary: Not everyone has a soulmate, but you'll know if you have one. You won't get a mark or a name, but they'll appear to you, when fear gripes your heart.A series of moments over the years, when they call on each other.
Relationships: Oliver Queen/Felicity Smoak
Comments: 117
Kudos: 473





	1. 1993

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 1993

Oliver’s mind races faster and faster, as though he’d been trying to stop the thoughts all month and his strength finally faltered. So they all come at once, rushing through his fingers, spilling out as he looks at Tommy from the window seat in his bedroom. The moon is full enough to illuminate Tommy sleeping in the sleeping bag next to Oliver’s on the floor of his bedroom.

Tommy looks normal when he sleeping. He looks like he did when his mom was still alive a month ago. He looks like he did before his dad had left him with the Queens a week ago. And Oliver still can’t wrap his mind around the idea that this all hasn’t been a really, _really_ bad dream.

That his best friend in the whole world didn’t just lose both his parents, just like that. Poof and they’re gone, like a really bad magic trick. How? How could this have happened? Tommy’s mom is _dead_.

Oliver doesn’t bother to wipe the tears that are falling, he knows its no use and he always sniffles more when he tries to get rid of them. He’s worried the sound would wake Tommy up. He doesn’t want to make his brother even sadder.

He’s just sort of, staring at Tommy, his mind tripping in circles, like a maze of spiraling bad thoughts. If Tommy’s mom can get shot, could his mom? What about Raisa? If Tommy’s dad can just, just leave, could his dad? Could Tommy die? What would he do without them? Any of them?

He’s almost not aware his breathing has gotten faster and faster until his breath catches, a warm weight suddenly appearing in his lap. His eyes automatically leave Tommy to find a little kid in his lap. His brain is so numb he can barely make it work hard enough to try to comprehend that there was a little brown haired, blue eyed four- or five-year-old sitting there, staring up at him solemnly.

She blinks once and then places a hand on his cheek. “What’s wrong?”

He stares at her and shakes his head, back and forth. “Everything.” The word is low and scratchy and he can hear his voice break on it.

She blinks at him again, sadness in her eyes slowly mirroring his own as if she can understand all the feelings he tried to put into the one word. Then her arms are around his neck as she gives him a hug and his arms automatically wrap around her returning it.

“I’m so scared,” he whispers, it’s the only time he’s admitted it since his mom first told him what happened. He wants to be brave for Tommy, to make sure Tommy knows Oliver is the best possible best friend to be backing him up in the whole world. He’s afraid if he tells anyone, it’ll all come pouring out. That they might tell him he should be scared. That it really is that easy to lose your whole family.

But it feels safe to tell her.

He doesn’t know how long they sit there, as he clutches the girl close. She never says anything else, but she doesn’t need to.

When he wakes up eventually to soft morning sunlight, still on the window seat, she’s gone.

It’s a few days later when it finally dawns on him, that he remembers about soulmates and how his mom had said if you have one, they help you when you’re scared. He doesn’t know what to think about something as big as soulmates or what it all means, especially when all he can focus on is being there for Tommy.

In the end, he never tells anyone, but he’s glad he hadn’t been alone.


	2. 1997

It’s nearly Oliver’s bedtime. He’s already in his pjs and brushed his teeth and he’s trying to make his Gameboy battery last, because Mom won’t let him keep the charger in his bedroom, when instinct makes him look up.

He frowns when he realizes he’s not in his room anymore. Instead he’s sitting on someone else’s bed instead of his own navy blue one—a girl’s by the looks of it. Oliver looks down at the purple bedspread and then over to the poster of colorful birds on the wall above a pile of computer parts with interest, but not surprise. In a way, he’d been wondering when he’d come to her.

He asked Raisa about soulmates around year ago. She explained that they’re rare, but some souls are connected in a way no one can explain, that they call to each other no matter where in the world they are. There isn’t a lot known about why or who and the connection can mean all sorts of different things, from best friends to siblings to romance to people who meet once and then never again. She said all that was for sure was that they were important and it was your job to always help your soulmate, if you were lucky enough to have one, because souls don’t call to each other without reason.

And as Oliver thinks that, as he realizes what that means, his eyes instinctively land on the form curled up in the corner behind the door. Her knees are pulled up, her face buried against them, long brown hair covering her from view. Her arms are clenched so tightly around her legs her knuckles are white.

He puts down the game and pushes off the bed automatically, an ache pulling at his heart as the muffled sobs reach his ears. He doesn’t know her, doesn’t understand the pull and what it means, not really, but he hates to see anyone so upset. She looks like she’s the same age he was four years ago.

He sits down on the floor next her, leans back against the same wall, and puts his hand on her shoulder, “What’s wrong?”

She doesn’t tense at his touch or flinch at his question, but she does tighten her arms around her knees. Oliver waits though, because he has a little sister now and he’s learned some patience from the experience. He remembers how bad he’d felt to call her to him the first time and things like that aren’t easy to talk about. So he waits.

Eventually she shifts, not picking her head up, but obviously unburying her mouth enough that her shaky, tear-streaked voice answers his question, “He’s gone. My dad. He left us. Mom told me, that he didn’t want to be a family anymore, that he wasn’t good for us. He didn’t even say goodbye. He’s just _gone_.”

Oliver’s heart aches for her, remembering Tommy’s face when his dad had told him he would be staying with the Queens for now and then walked out the door. Ignoring Tommy’s pleas, as he grabbed for him. It had been harder when Tommy had stopped yelling, when he watched his dad’s car drive away silently. When he realized he couldn’t make him stay.

Tommy’s mom had been taken from him, but his dad left. It had broken something different in him.

Oliver’s hand on her shoulder moves across her back and he tugs her closer, pressing her into his side. She falls against him, still curled up, but unresisting, adjusting enough that she isn’t elbowing him in the side.

“Why aren’t I good enough? What’s wrong with me?” her voice is plaintive and desperate. Her breath is coming quicker with each question, “Why doesn’t he want me?”

“I don’t know,” Oliver says and his own voice cracks. It’s what he’s always thought when Tommy looked at him with the same question in his eyes, if not on his lips. He feels helpless and angry and sad all over again. Tommy’s dad came back a couple of years after, but only enough to take Tommy out of the Queens’ house. But he’s never really come back, even if Tommy pretends. Oliver’s his best friend, his brother, so he knows the truth anyways. “I don’t know. I don’t know. It’s not your fault.”

Her voice is angry as she pulls her head up and glares at him with red, puffy eyes, “Then who’s fault is it?”

“His,” Oliver replies immediately, almost grateful she asked, grateful he gets to say this to her. “It’s _his_ fault for being stupid. _His_ fault for leaving.”

Her anger bleeds out of her at that and only despair remains, “But if I had been a better daughter, if we’d been a better family, if I could’ve made him love me more, love us more—”

“You shouldn’t have to make your dad love you,” he cuts her off and her tears fall faster, but she doesn’t look away, doesn’t argue. There’s too much conviction in his voice for that. “You shouldn’t have to make your family stay.”

He thinks of his own family. Recently, his parents have been busy. He thinks of long business trips and frigid dinners, where his parents are physically at the table, but might as well be a million miles away. The sudden increase broken promises to come to baseball games or spend time together. His parents act like nothing’s changed, but he can tell something has and he has no idea how to stop the distance from growing worse.

The girl stares at him, seeming to understand some of what he isn’t saying. Still she asks, “Then why did he _leave_?”

“I don’t know,” his voice breaks on the words and he’s crying too. “I don’t know.” She presses closer to him and they don’t say another word, just hold tight to each other.

She wakes a few hours later, in the dark, in the corner—alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The plan is to update this story every Saturday and the chapters should also get longer, as they get older.
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	3. 2000

Oliver is sitting in the car in the garage, the one his dad had told him he’d teach him in. Their lesson was supposed to start three hours ago. He stares duly through the windshield and refuses to read the message Raisa had brought down to him an hour ago, a single glance at it had told him all he needed to know. “Work eme…”

Why was it so hard to set aside time to teach your kid to drive? Why was it hard to tell him ahead of time if he couldn’t make it? Why couldn’t his dad make him a priority? He remembered a time where he actually used to see his dad more than once a week for more than twenty minutes.

These days all his dad cared about was the fucking company and he only paid attention to tell Oliver how bad of a job he was doing to prepare to take his own place at it. Who gave a shit about algebra or networking or any of that? He was still just a teenager.

Can’t they just be normal parents? At least his dad used to try harder. The summer used to be when his dad actually took time to hang out with him and Tommy. There used to be family vacations in July and baseball games and they used to actually talk. He can’t remember the last time his dad had tried to talk to Oliver about something Oliver actually cared about.

He just wants his dad to teach him how to drive, Oliver thinks as he tries to focus on his anger and not the burn of tears he can feel building. _But he’s not going to, is he?_ Oliver realizes. He’s going to keep canceling until Oliver gives up and has whichever driver is around teach him instead.

Oliver’s eyes dart to the wall, where the keys hang on a hook. Or maybe Oliver should just teach himself. And if something breaks, well then maybe his fucking dad should have been there.

He’s ripped from his thoughts and he nearly falls over when he’s suddenly standing in someone’s living room next to the front door, instead sitting in his dark garage. He briefly takes in the white walls and old furniture as he looks for what he knows pulled him here, his anger falling away abruptly.

The girl is a couple years older again, which makes sense since its been almost as long again since they last saw each other. Her light brown hair swirls behind her as she paces. He doesn’t yet know how to think about what she will mean to him. Soulmates are confusing, its easier to focus on her fear and his worry.

“What’s wrong?” he says, because he doesn’t know much, but he does know he hates to see her afraid. _Irony points for that, at least_ he thinks to the universe.

She doesn’t even look at him when she replies, “My mom was supposed to be home from work an hour ago.”

He stares at her and for the first time, he feels uncomfortable, like he doesn’t understand her. He frowns because he doesn’t get it and he doesn’t know what to say. Parents are late all the time.

As if she can sense his confusion, blue eyes behind large glasses turn to him, real fear and hard-edged panic clear in her gaze. The words come pouring out of her, “Her shift ended an hour and a half ago and she’s. not. home.” She points as she talks, her voice slowing down and then speeding to a rush. “She’s not like, the greatest when it comes to getting home on time, but she always calls or leaves a message on the answering machine if she’s staying after with friends or if she picked up an extra shift. She always calls. If not, she’s never this late without a message.”

Before he can respond, she turns to pace again, wringing her hands as worse fears rush out of her, “What if she was in a car accident? Or she got mugged?” Her almost fever bright eyes are on him, desperation in them. “Or some creep followed her to her car? Customers do that, you know? She thought I didn’t hear what Alyssa said, but I did and I know what drunk men can do to pretty waitresses.”

His heart thuds in his chest as he stares at this girl, who apparently knows too much. Did he know that eleven? He wants to say something, her name, ask her to calm down, but his voice is frozen in his throat.

The look on his face seems to make her fears real in way her panicked thoughts hadn’t been, saying them out loud causing her to feel her stomach drop through her chest. “What if she doesn’t come home?” Her voice wobbles as she says her real fear.

He can hear the “too” she doesn’t tack on to the end and suddenly, they meet in the center of the room, his arms pulling her into a fierce hug as she buries her face against his shoulder.

She’s shaking against him and he feels useless as well as a jerk. He was annoyed his dad wouldn’t give him a driving lesson and she’s worried her mom has been mugged or murdered or… He tries to wrap her up tighter, as if he can physically hold her together.

It actually seems to be working and her shaking has almost vanished when the silence is interrupted by a mechanical voice. She tenses in his arms all over again as they both listen.

“Code 10, major motor vehicle incident on Luther. Two vehicle crash, a red SUV and a black pick-up truck...” She relaxes after hearing the vehicles involved and ignores the rest of the message.

“Is that a police radio?” Oliver asks, bewildered.

“Yeah,” the girl admits as she pulls back, looking a little sheepish. “I figured out how to use it to listen to what they’re saying to each other, but nothing about someone matching my mom’s description or car has come through. I know all her co-workers’ cars too.”

He looks down at her questioningly until she finally meets his gaze and flushes, “I’m good with technology.”

“Alright,” he said, bemused before refocusing. “Well, if they haven’t said anything, then that’s probably a good sign.”

“I guess,” she acknowledges, although Oliver can tell its stopping her fear from growing, but not shrinking it.

“She’s just always called before,” the girl admits, looking almost embarrassed. She steps away from him and his arms fall to his sides. “I’m not some little kid who can’t stay home alone. I’ve been staying home alone since I was eight. It’s just, she calls, when she’s going to be this late and I know maybe she just couldn’t or didn’t know, but… What if its not?”

“Its nice that she calls,” Oliver says, trying to distract her. “My parents call someone else to tell us if they’re gonna be late. And then I have to explain to my little sister why they aren’t here for her swim test instead.”

“That sucks,” she acknowledges, understanding evident in her voice. “My mom works a lot, so I get why she can’t always come to stuff or why I can’t go, but she tells me herself and apologizes. I believe her when she says she wishes she could be there.”

Oliver gives a little laugh, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard either of my parents say “sorry”, not for something real. They just make excuses.”

His voice deepens as he mimics his dad’s voice, “Oliver, the meeting ran over—you know I can’t let the Board down.” He switches to his mom, “The fundraiser would have fallen apart if I left and then what would you say to those little kids with cancer? It all boils down to the same excuse: we tried but obviously this other thing is far more important than you, you understand, right? The fact that you crossed our minds is good enough, right?”

“Oliver…” she says, the sympathy in her voice tugs at him.

Her voice snaps him out of his self-pity and he shakes his head, “And here I am complaining about something silly like that when you’re worried about your mom, I’m sorry. It must sound really stupid.”

“It doesn’t,” she says, shaking her head, but it reminds her of why he’s here. “I just—” She’s cut off by the sound of the front door unlocking and their eyes fix on it.

“Mom!” she exclaims, letting him go to hug the pretty blonde woman coming in through the door.

Her mom automatically wraps her arms around her daughter even as she stares down at her in confusion. “Felicity? What are you still doing up?”

“I was waiting for you,” Felicity says, her voice muffled from the way she’s still pressed against her mom. “Why didn’t you call?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, sweetie,” her mom says, rubbing her back a bit before letting her go. “There was a back-up leaving the casino,” she waves her hand dismissively as she goes to put her purse down. “And then I just had to help Beth get her little boy to sleep, he’s so cute. He’s almost eight months now. I could—”

“Mom!” Felicity says frustrated now with her mom’s nonchalant attitude. “I was worried about you!”

“I’m fine, Felicity,” Donna says with a careless smile and a roll of her eyes. “You know I’ll always come home.”

“You can’t know that!” Felicity protests, her hands curled into fists at her side. Oliver can tell she’s frustrated with how little her mom is taking notice of her fears. He’s a little annoyed himself, can’t she see how shook up Felicity is?

“Of course, I can,” She cupped Felicity’s cheek and then patted it, “Nothing’s going to happen to me, sweetheart. You worry too much.”

She gave her daughter one more quick hug around the shoulders before heading into the kitchen in search of some food, it had been a long shift. “You should get off to bed—we’re going to need to get up bright and early to go shopping tomorrow.”

“Mom!” Felicity protested, frustration replacing her anger and fear. “I don’t want to…”

Oliver was gone before he got to hear the end of her sentence, but at least he knew her name now. Felicity.


	4. 2003

Oliver throws the tennis ball in his hand against the floor, bouncing it off the wall, and catches it again. Trying to let the repetitive motion and rhythm of the movements calm him, drive his thoughts from his mind.

It isn’t working.

Felicity carefully snaps the clips down as she slots the memory into place on her motherboard. It’s taken her nearly a year to buy everything she needs for this computer, using the library internet to find everything, carefully picking up components from sales, managing the clothing money her mom had given her.

She has the radio on low, enough so that it isn’t silent, but not loud enough to be distracting. It takes a few minutes for the three-beat _thump_ noise to register as something separate from the music. She looks around to find the source.

Oliver hears faint music and frowns, although his movements don’t falter. His walls should be thick enough to prevent any music Raisa might be playing as she cleans from seeping through and Thea is at camp this week. Oliver glances toward the hall, his frown deepening.

Their eyes meet.

For the first time, as they pull at each other, the scene flickers around them. Its not until later that they independently realize it’s because they were both scared out of their minds.

“Felicity.”

“Oliver.”

“What’s wrong?” they ask simultaneously.

Felicity looks away first, fiddling with her static wristband. She thinks about brushing it off, but he’s here in her kitchen now so what’s the point, “I can’t stay here. I can’t become my mother. I have to get out.” Even now, it feels like the walls of their apartment are pressing in around her, trying to suffocate her. “I want to be anywhere, but here.”

She feels a little lighter, almost unmoored, having admitted it to someone. She looks up at him from the floor. A challenge in her eyes that says, my cards are on the table, “You?”

He stares into those blue eyes behind her glasses and it spills out, “There’s too much. They want too much from me.” He feels like he’s drowning in their expectations. And he knows he can never, ever live up to them. “It’s like they think if they wait long enough, I’ll magically turn into the son they always wanted instead of the screw up they got. I can’t be what they want. I don’t want to be.”

Felicity looks at him with clear, sharp eyes, “Who do you want to be?”

“I have no fucking clue,” Oliver admits. “I just don’t wanna turn into my dad.”

“Yeah,” Felicity says with a sigh and push of her hand through her hair. “Welcome to the club.” Then she blinks and corrects herself, “I mean, I don’t want to be my mom instead of my dad, but same deal.” She pauses as she thinks over what she just said, “Don’t want to be him either, I suppose.”

“Yeah,” Oliver says with a sigh. “I don’t want to be either of my parents.” His dad is the more obvious role model to avoid but his mom too, he doesn’t want her life anymore than he wants his dad's. They’re just trying to make him into his dad, so he pushes harder against that. “They seem so determined to make me, though. I don’t know how to stop it.”

Felicity nods in sympathy. “For me its more like, Mom wants me to be like her—sure—because she likes it when we share things in common, but its more like it feels as though life is determined that it be my only option.”

“So what _are_ the other options?” Oliver asks, glad to focus on her problems over his own. They end up sticking around her kitchen and Oliver can see not much has changed since he was last here except for the computer parts scattered all over the place.

“I could join a card counting ring,” Felicity remarks as she looks back down at the computer she’s building. “I’m too young to go in person, but there are always people behind the scenes so they can alternate their players enough without anyone catching on.”

“Seems dangerous,” Oliver says unable to control his concern or surprise. “And not at all I was expecting you to say.”

Felicity shrugs, “Its not my first choice either, but if it worked it’d be the easiest and fastest way to get money and get out of town that way.”

“You still seem a bit young to begin a life of crime,” he says keeping his tone light, still hoping she’s kidding.

Felicity looks up at him, “Plenty start younger.” She lets it hang between them until he nods an acknowledgement of her point before she deflates, “But you’re right. That’s the daydream plan, not a real one. No one would take me seriously—I’d just end up with people taking advantage.”

“The real life plan has been tutoring for extra money,” she admits, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. It’s not going as well as she’d hoped. “I’m making some from it, but not enough. Everyone at my school is just as poor as I am and no one at the private schools wants a tutor from public, even if she is a Mathletics champion. I got more for getting rid of Jenny’s rich cousin’s parking ticket before his parents found out than a month’s worth of tutoring.”

Oliver doesn’t add anything to that, because yeah, sounds about right.

“No, I think its gotta be college.” She fits another component in place as she talks, “If I can get a good enough scholarship for a full ride, not just tuition, but room and board too…”

“What about after?”

“With the right degree, I can get a good job.” Her face twists, “One that involves no drunk customers or sixty hour weeks.”

“Something with computers,” Oliver guesses. “Right?”

“Yeah, I tried…” It had taken her time to look at all the things left behind, all the things she shared with her dad without feeling the pain of his abandonment. “Dad was good with computers, I built my first one with his extra parts so I… but I like it and him being good at computers isn’t why he left. It won’t make me like him.”

“No,” Oliver agrees. “It won’t.”

Felicity tries to suppress the thought that it’s the part of her plan that involves finding the best college as far from Vegas and leaving her mom behind—that’s what makes her like her father. She manages not to voice that out loud, “I need to graduate and get through high school as quickly as possible. I don’t think I can skip any more grades though. Maybe I should just sign up for more AP classes.”

“That math champion thing should help too,” Oliver adds, just going with it because he can barely pass classes at the usual pace let alone skip grades and its intimidating to think about how smart the girl in front of him is. “The amount of times my mom complained about my lack of extracurricular activities when I was applying was stupid. As if it wasn’t all going to come down to money anyway.”

Felicity hums, her focus drawn back to the next part she was installing. Once its set, she feels herself more settled having talked to someone about her plan, that he hadn’t dismissed her or it. She can feel the clawing trapped feeling, the fear that had been gripping her, fade. As her breathing eases, her kitchen fades and they’re solidly in his bedroom.

He stiffens at the scene change and she leans back on her heels to look up at him. He glares at the wall and throws the tennis ball again. She gets to her feet as he resumes his earlier rhythm and presses his lips tightly together. Felicity ends up sitting in his desk chair, pointedly ignoring the top-of-the-line PC on his desk.

He can feel her gaze on him and when he turns his head, she’s staring at him expectantly.

“My parents, they want me to take over the family business. That’s always been the plan and it always been there, that expectation. But now, its like they’re putting a actual plan in place for that to really happen and I… I can’t. I don’t want that. I don’t want to run a company, I don’t think I can—even if they think college or whatever, will teach me, I still don’t…”

He cuts himself off, “I’m good at certain things, I know that. Not a huge fan, but I’ve learned the networking, the charming or whatever,” he waves his hand as he switches to pacing. “I can _schmooze_ as Tommy likes to say. I can generally read people well, what they want. Mainly because most of them are shallow, but whatever. Traveling is fun, I’m good at languages, I guess. I used to be good at hockey before Mom made me quit. I can do some things well.” He hopes he doesn’t sound as defensive as he feels. Its not his fault he knows he’s nothing special.

“But they don’t translate to running a company,” he says, trying to get back to his point. “All the business skills, all the long-term planning, and judging, and responsibility for people’s lives. I don’t want that and it doesn’t interest me at all.”

Oliver still doesn’t feel like he’s explaining well enough, “Its not just that I think it seems boring, which, yeah, it does, but its more than that.” He tries to communicate that he gets that life isn’t all fun and games, but you should want some part of your job, right? You should be able to find pieces you like doing, or at least feel neutral about, right?

“The idea of day in and day out doing nothing but worry about keeping some board of directors happy, of budgets and projections, and profit margins. Constantly making so many decisions that have such big consequences,” he trails off, shaking his head at the imagining of that being the rest of his life.

Oliver turns to Felicity and looks her in the eyes for the first time during this monologue, “Dad really does enjoy being CEO. Not every part of it, but he likes it more than he doesn’t. But never seeing my family or only having friends so we can make deals and all the passive aggressive bullshit both my parents seem to love isn’t for me, putting up with all of that isn’t worth it to me.”

Felicity pulls up her leg up and sets her foot on the desk chair. With her arms wrapped around her knee, she asks quietly “Have you told them that?” She’s pretty sure she already knows the answer.

“Yes,” he says, deflating before she can see the frustration bubble back up in him with each subsequent word, “But they act as though I’ll change my mind. Like they know me better than I do. Sometimes they get this look in their eyes, this tone, and I can tell the root of it is that they don’t care. They don’t care that I don’t want this or can’t do it. They’re going to force it until it seems like it works, until I look like Oliver Queen, CEO, from the outside and they’ll just damage control anything that doesn’t fit that image.”

He stops, running his fingers through his hair and begs her to understand. “I can’t live like that.”

“And then, then they lay on the guilt,” he throws the ball and doesn’t even try to catch it as it bounces away across the floor of his bedroom. “They talk about the advantages I have and how hard they worked to get here and I get it. I know that its stupid to complain about this, but if I really have so much opportunity, then why can’t I actually make a choice, for once in my life. Why can’t I decide something that means something?”

“I never asked for all this legacy. And maybe that makes me the most ungrateful person on the planet. But I don’t want it. I just don’t.”

Felicity studies him carefully, thinks about everything he’s said and a few things he hasn’t but she feels she heard all the same. “I don’t think its ungrateful to want to chose how your life is going to go,” she says simply. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know!” He clenches his fists in frustration before taking a deep breath and uncurling his fingers purposely. As he runs his fingers through his hair, he knows he sounds more defeated as he says, “I don’t know how to make them stop and back off. I just need to make them see that I’m different, that they can’t just shove me at the company and expect it all to work out.”

“How can you show them that?” Felicity persists. She can see Oliver’s too in his head with this, too focused on how it feels and not on what to do. “What would make them listen?”

“I don’t…” he says halfheartedly, pausing to look out the window and try to really, think about it. What he needs is for them to stop seeing what they want to see when they look at him. That means he needs to break that image. “I need to show them exactly why I can’t be my dad. Why I shouldn’t be trusted to be put in charge of anything. The only times they look like they see me if when I fuck up—that disappointment is definitely with the real me. Maybe if I screw around at school long enough, they’ll stop pushing.”

Oliver’s starting to lean into this plan, he hadn’t been looking forward to spending all day studying for a job he didn’t want. “Even if they cut me off, Tommy has my back. And maybe then I could ignore them, get some space. Actually try to think over the noise of their expectations. Figure out something myself for once.”

Felicity’s pretty sure this is _not_ a good plan and she knows it’s definitely a self-destructive one, but she understands needing space and if this is really the only way he thinks he can get that, get space to figure himself out, she’s not going to argue against it. She doesn’t know enough about his world to know if he needs to do something this drastic because she doesn’t know his parents.

Her mom’s never understood computers or coding or why Felicity likes them, why they make sense to her, but she does know that they do. She doesn’t ignore the parts of Felicity’s personality she doesn’t understand, even if she tries to, well, help Felicity supposes, her move past her awkwardness. She knows she’d be pulling her hair out if her mom on top of everything else refused not to see who she was the way Oliver’s parents seem to.

“Okay,” she says and she can see the surprise on his face when he looks at her. “You deserve to make your own choices, and if you think this is the right move, then do it.”

Oliver’s surprised at the confidence that fills him at her words, at her steady belief in him. Felicity doesn’t have expectations for him. He finds it’s a very comforting feeling, her support. “Thanks, I will. And I’m sure I don’t have to tell you, you’re going to crush it. No way will you get stuck any where you don’t want to be.”

Felicity grins at him, “Thanks.”

It’s the first encounter that leaves them both truly feeling better, instead of just not alone.


	5. 2006

From the too white, too bright walls, Felicity can tell they’re in a hospital room and her trepidation grows. “Oliver!” She spins around quickly, worried about what she’s going to find.

He’s slumped in a plastic chair, someone else in the bed next to him and she breathes a sigh of relief that she immediately feels guilty for. “Felicity…” he sounds so weary as he says her name, his head still bowed.

Her eyes scan him for injury, but she finds none. “What happened?”

Oliver’s hand tightens compulsively around the hand he’s holding in his own before quickly checking that he didn’t accidently wake Tommy up. When Tommy still shows no sign he noticed the increase in pressure, Oliver represses a bolt of fear. He’s going to wake up. He’s got to. The doctor said he would.

He straightens before leaning back in his chair with a sigh and brings his eyes up to Felicity’s. “Alcohol poisoning. He’s gonna be fine, that’s what they said, I mean.”

She’s next to him now, a hand on his shoulder without thinking. They’re older now, more aware they’re strangers despite the connection, and so physical comfort isn’t as instinctive, but the impulse is definitely still there.

When all her blue eyes do is stare at him patiently, Oliver finds the story spilling out, “Tommy and I were at this party; it was a friend’s 21st birthday. We were just playing some stupid games, started with Beirut—Tommy and I are great partners—but then we got separated.” Its still a little hard for him to piece together the timeline, the point of these parties was to blur everything in a haze of pointless fun and alcohol after all.

“When I found him a couple hours later, he was finishing some shot drinking contest. He seemed fine at first—happy he won. No worse off than usual, but after a couple minutes… He was having trouble standing and he wasn’t making a lot of sense, but he still tried to get another drink. I told him to forget it, tried to distract him. He didn’t listen. I was gonna let him buy the drink and then… get rid of it somehow. I can’t remember what the plan was.” He ran his fingers through his hair with the hand not still holding Tommy’s.

“The rest isn’t.... He fell, a couple times. He couldn’t talk. Then he collapsed and wouldn’t wake up. Someone, maybe me? Called 911. And here we are.”

Felicity has no idea what to say. She’s been to some parties since starting college, but never one where she or anyone she knew got this out of control. Maybe it was just because she was a girl and there were other dangers, that she never turned off her internal drink counter, making sure she never had too many. And she was self-conscious about her age so she was extra cautious. “I’m sorry, about Tommy. I’m sure he’s going to be okay.”

“I’m such a moron,” Oliver says, closing his eyes. “I should have just taken the last drink from him and dumped it on the ground. I should have stuck closer to him.”

“The buddy system is always a good call,” Felicity acknowledges.

Oliver gives a hollow laugh. “Some partner in crime I’ve been. He always goes harder after his dad visits and I knew that. I let him do this to himself.”

Felicity doesn’t like the way his thoughts are spiraling and knows she needs to pull him out of it. “Oliver, if you could have done anything to prevent this,” she gestures Tommy unconscious on the hospital bed. “Would you have?”

“Of course,” Oliver’s voice is harsh and so is his glare, but she ignores it even though he’s standing up now, towering over her. “How can you even ask that? He’s my best friend.”

Felicity continues to look up at him steadily, refusing to back up an inch. “Will you do everything you can to never let this happen again?”

“Yes,” he vows then and there.

Felicity shrugs, placing her hand on his arm and giving it a squeeze. “Then its not your fault and it won’t be a problem ever again.” Felicity’s heart aches for him and she hopes he listens. The way he looks at Tommy is painful and, in that moment, Felicity’s never been so sure she’s never really had a best friend before. “So stop blaming yourself.”

Oliver deflates at that, before nodding resolutely. He collapses back in his chair and takes another look at his brother in all but name. He still looks so still and pale. Oliver can’t keep looking at him like this.

He turns to look at Felicity, purposely focusing on her. She looks older, which, yeah, its been a few years so of course she does, but she looks less like a kid, like there’s less of an age difference, which he knows doesn’t make any sense.

Oliver also notices her hair, which had always been long and light brown, is now shorter, jet black with red streaks. In fact, he looks over her whole outfit, she seems to have taken the opportunity to reinvent herself to some degree if the ripped jean shorts over sheer black tights in very tall black combat books and tank top with some sort of punk band logo on it are anything to go by. She definitely hadn’t looked like this last time.

It takes his mind off Tommy’s condition for a minute and Oliver latches onto the idea of a distraction. “Talk to me about something else.”

Something about the way he looks her up and down before he says that makes her pretty sure he’s really asking about her new look, but she doesn’t want to defend her style choices, not when her mother complains every time she sees her.

Its also weird because, everyone at college didn’t know her before so they don’t have any point of comparison for her. Its strangely disconcerting for him to see her like this. She grabs for something else to say, “I’m about to start my second year of college.”

He blinks, staring at her. Whenever they’re not with each other, the times they are together seem so much more like dreams. His mind is trying to catch up, pushing through his hang over. His memories are slowly getting clearer with her here again. He could have sworn she was younger than that. Besides he's still sort of drunk. “Really?”

“I graduated high school early,” Felicity admits, a little sheepishly. That was another advantage of her college look, made her look older, made her feel less like a kid pretending to be a college student.

Their last conversation finally comes back into focus and Oliver feels like more of a moron than usual, “Oh right, that was your plan. Guess it worked out. Congrats.”

She’s blushing, but she nods and smiles at him, “Thanks.”

Oliver suddenly wonders if it was possible they might run into each other, in real life. The idea is so strange, he can’t help but ask, “Where are you going?”

Felicity ruffles the hair at the back of her neck and admits, “Uh, MIT.”

Oliver coughs and looks at her with wide eyes, “Seriously? You really are actual genius, aren’t you?”

“Kinda.”

Its not that he didn’t realize she was smart. After all, she’d said something about skipping grades and she’d been building a computer the last time they’d seen each other, but still. “Cool.” Because it is and he has no idea how to contribute anything to this sort of conversation. Felicity was a literal genius who worked her ass off to get into a genius school and Oliver has already flunked out of two schools, because he was trying to be a screw up.

Felicity smiles, her eyes crinkling in amusement at his word choice.

“What are you majoring in? Computer science?”

“Yup,” Felicity confirms. “On track to get a master’s degree after that. I’m still deciding between general Computer Science or Cyber Security.”

“Yeah?” Oliver prompts.

Felicity gets he’s asking for her to take his mind off his friend. Let it never be said that Felicity Smoak passed on an opportunity where someone was asking her to babble. She launches into an overview of her first year, what it was like moving from Vegas to Cambridge, classes she liked, and so on.

Oliver mostly sits back and let her talk, only adding in little comments to show he is in fact listening and she could see that he did seem to be relaxing a little. His eyes still dart to Tommy every few minutes, but he’s holding himself less stiffly which she takes as a win.

Oliver likes hearing Felicity talk about her first year of college, marveling at how different it was from his own college experience. Is this what it supposed to be? A chance to reinvent yourself and find out what you wanted to do with your life? She was so excited about everything and it just manages to draw his attention to the fact that he isn’t. That his life feels so empty. That he dreads the future instead of looking forward to it.

Felicity managed to graduate early, and move across the country to go to college by herself, and is working hard to make her life what she wants it to be. And here he is, screwing his life up just because he could, without even trying to figure out what he really wanted—let alone go after it. How pathetic.

Maybe it was time to admit that, while her plan had worked great, his was turning out to be a failure. Or at least a holding pattern. His parents were definitely frustrated with him, that was for sure, but they also kept covering for him, kept trying to smooth over what he was doing. His dad is still acting like it was a phase and hasn’t given up in the slightest regarding his big legacy plan for Oliver.

Oliver feels like he’s distracting them and himself, but not actually changing anything. He still doesn’t know how to actually change things though. But maybe he should start actually trying to figure that out. It’s so much easier to pretend when he’s only coasting along with Tommy, who’s more or less in the same hedonistic head-in-the-sand boat, than Felicity, who is so fiercely fighting for her future.

“Ollie?” a faint and raspy voice from his left asks, cutting Felicity off.

Oliver’s head whips around so fast Felicity’s surprised he doesn’t give himself whiplash. “Tommy!”

Felicity watches as the guy on the bed blinks blearily at Oliver and tries for a smile, “You were right, maybe I shouldn’t have had that last drink.”

Oliver’s laughing with relief as he gives his friend a hug and Felicity finds herself smiling when she turns back to her laptop.


	6. 2007

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: discussion of canonical Robert Queen suicide.

Oliver leans against a tree, sweating, as he stares blankly at the large pile of stones a few yards away. He’s trying to keep his mind as blank as his expression but he’s pretty sure he’s not succeeding. The physical act of burying his father has eroded away the numbness he’s been feeling since the life raft, has worn away his conviction that this is all a horrible nightmare.

This is real. He’s trying to hold on to the dull emotions of the past few days brought on by shock, lack of food, and sunstroke primarily, but real emotions are creeping back in as his mind spins.

“Oliver!”

He flinches at the sound of Felicity’s voice and fucking figures. This is exactly what he was hoping to avoid. He didn’t want her to have to be here, to know this. A wasted effort, clearly.

He plans on not looking, not able to bare her presence on this island, because that means he’s really here too, but then she calls his name again and the fear in her voice is finally enough for him to look.

He finds her instantly, a single figure alone on the beach and as if his gaze on her is all she needed, her head wipes around with unerring accuracy and she finds him just as quickly.

Her beat up sneakers struggle in the sand even though they don’t leave any evidence of her presence as she sprints over to him.

Oliver makes no move to get up and watches as she falls to her knees next him.

“What happened to you?” Felicity sounds horrified. He’s sure his appearance isn’t reassuring her. He knows his shirt is torn and stiff with dried salt water, same with his shorts. He’s fairly certain he’s sunburned too. Her hands reach out as if to touch him, but it’s clear she doesn’t know where might be safe to.

“There was an accident,” Oliver’s aware his voice is shaking and hoarse. “I was on the boat with Dad. The storm…” He closes his eyes and takes a breath, “We got to a life raft. My dad and me and one of the crew. Everyone else went down with the boat.”

“Oh, Oliver…” Felicity looks like she wants to say something comforting, but has no idea what that could be. He waits though, because her mind works faster than anyone else he knows. He’s distracting himself by looking at her, at how outplace she looks in her long sleeved black shirt and beat up jeans on this pristine beach, distracting himself from the answer to the question she’s going to ask.

He’s staring at her hair, wondering how she decides what color to dye the streaks near the front because they had been red when he last saw her and now they’re dark blue, when she pushes some of the long dark strands behind her ear and looks around. He sees her spot the raft yards away by a rock. He sees her look for other people and find none.

Her eyes are back on him and he doesn’t need her to voice the question in her eyes, “There wasn’t enough food and water for the three of us. One of the bags of supplies hadn’t been tied down properly and we weren’t in sight of land after the storm ended.” Oliver tries to keep his voice steady, but its more disbelieving than anything when he says, “Dad pulled out a gun and _shot_ the other person with us and then himself. For me, so I’d make it.”

Oliver won’t stop staring at piles of stones across from him. Felicity looks at it, the knowledge of what he’d just told her banging for attention in her brain. She sees drag marks and footsteps and Felicity just knows that’s where his dad is now.

“Oh god, Oliver. I’m so sorry,” is all she can say. She carefully puts a hand on his shoulder and somehow that touch, no matter how strange it translates to physical reality is what breaks him.

Abruptly his face is buried in her shoulder and he’s sobbing. For everything’s that happened, for his dad, for everyone who died, for the fact that the sacrifice his dad made means nothing. He’s going to die here, on this island in the middle of the ocean.

He doesn’t know how he feels simultaneously like its not fair that he, the stupid rich kid, survived and also thought he didn’t deserve _this_ , for all the ways he’d fucked up his own life. Why couldn’t someone who had a chance of surviving longer than a handful of days on this island have gotten here? Why didn’t his Dad stay and help him? Why is Oliver even here? Why isn’t he at the bottom of the ocean? Why isn’t he asleep in some fancy Chinese hotel trying to think of ways to avoid conversations about his future with his dad?

Well, that’s one thing at least, he doesn’t have to worry about his future anymore. Starvation versus dehydration both seem pretty terrible and both will be over in a few days.

It’s not like he’d made any real progress with dealing with his future before this trip. For all his promises to himself the last time he’d seen Felicity, he’d barely done anything to try to make his life his own. All he’d really managed to do was convince Tommy to join him on a year off to travel around the world instead of wasting his time flunking out at another college his parents paid his way into. It had been a decision he was happy with and he’s glad he did it, but when the trip was over, he’d found himself right back where he’d started.

He wants to have the conversation with his dad he hadn’t been able to bring himself to have, despite being on that stupid boat for days. He wants his mother, with her conviction and determination, to tell him what to do so he can argue with her. He wants Thea following him around, asking a million questions as he trips over her. He wants his friends, even if Tommy would just complain about how boring yachts are and ninety percent of what Laurel would say to him would be sarcastic comments, a habit of hers ever since their break up.

He wants so many things and people he’s never going to see again.

Felicity might sense something different about him because suddenly she’s pulling his face back, running one hand through his hair and using the other to whip some tears away. “Hey, its not over yet, Oliver. You know that, right?” Her gaze is frantic as she meets his own.

“Isn’t it?” Oliver asks dully. “I wasn’t exactly a boy scout, Felicity. I don’t know the first thing about surviving on some island until a ship might sail by. We’re in the middle of the ocean somewhere. I don’t think anyone’s going to find me or come looking, not until its already too late. By the time people find out about the wreck, they’ll assume we all drowned.”

“You can’t give up before you even try,” Felicity looks outraged and it actually cuts through the haze of fear and grief that’s been clouding his mind. “You’re not trapped on some raft drifting on the waves, you’re on land. There are clearly trees and plants and water. What if there are people here who can help? What if another ship heard your distress calls? You’re just going to resign yourself to your fate?”

“I…” Oliver starts to say, but he doesn’t know where to go from there. He does feel some energy starting to creep back into his veins, after he’d thought he’d exhausted it all burying his dad.

Felicity continues to glare at him, “And what are you talking about, no one’s going to look for you? That no one knows what happened. I’m here. I know,” she declares. A strange, belligerent confidence in her eyes, she says, “I’ll find you.”

Oliver’s eyes go wide. “Felicity…”

“You know what I can do with a computer,” she gives him a crooked smile before the more serious expression from before takes over her face again. “I will find you. And you better be ready for when I do.”

For all his faith in her genius, it seems like an impossible task. Still he feels his fear abate, just slightly. Someone knows he’s alive and is going to try to find him. Its selfish, but he can’t help the hope it brings him, the small, preposterous feeling of safety it brings him.

She smiles as she starts to fade, as if she can tell why. “We’ll get you off this island, I promise.”

And Oliver’s left staring at the uninterrupted horizon, alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Its hard to work some things in due to the way the story is set up and how it flows, but for anyone who wants to know, the canonical divergences are as follows. Oliver flunked out of 2 colleges and then traveled around Europe and Asia with Tommy for a year. Prior to that trip, Oliver broke up with Laurel via text (he was definitely an asshole about it). However, that also means Sara was not on the Queen's Gambit because Oliver wasn't using her as a way to force a break up with Laurel. Also, there is no List. Robert Queen was still an asshole business man and so is Malcolm Merlyn, he's just not a literal super villain. A natural storm sunk the yacht.


	7. 2008

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: discussion of canonical Cooper Seldon suicide.
> 
> This was actually harder to write than the ship wreck.

Felicity is shaking as she sorts her clothes, as she tries to decide what she’ll donate and what can stay in her new life. Something pulls her mind off the task, a sudden awareness that she isn’t alone.

She forces her hands to stop still and tries to will her fear away. She counts her breath the way the school counselor had taught her in a vain attempt to calm down. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, breathe in. 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, breathe out.

“Felicity,” Oliver says and the sound of her name brings any control over herself she’s regained to an end. She still refuses to turn around and face another person she can’t save, can’t protect. Since her face will give her away, she stares at her bed and the clothes on it blindly.

His hand lands on her shoulder and she jumps, even as she starts to automatically lean towards him, his presence a comforting lodestone she can’t resist.

“Hey, hey—what’s wrong?” Oliver’s voice is soft and gentle and she can’t take it.

She gives a cracked laugh as she folds the jacket in her hands. “What isn’t?”

Oliver just stares at her and tries to figure out why Felicity looks seconds away from shattering. He glances around, but her dorm room looks the same as it had the one other time he’d been here for a minute or so when she had a nightmare a few months ago.

That had been happening a little more frequently, quick glimpses of the other’s life, moments here and there of terror, just enough to pull the other, but not enough to keep them. It’s how Oliver knows Felicity knows he’s not alone on the island. That wilderness survival isn’t the biggest danger. They haven’t had more than five minutes of sustained time, but this visit looks like it’s shaping up to be more like that. He’s glad to see her but dreading what could be making her feel this way.

Oliver refocuses, maybe the room is a little more packed than last time? Is it time for the semester to end already? He thought her degree track meant she stayed on campus all year round. Has something happened with school? Is that what’s causing her to feel like this? To bring him to her?

He watches a shiver of tension go up her spine with a sharp feeling in his gut. She takes a deep breath and he’s almost afraid of what she’s going to say, what could make her act like this.

Her voice is steadier, but with a sort of iron control he isn’t familiar with, not from her. “I shouldn’t be distracting you from island stuff. I promise I’ll be fine, just give me a minute to calm down.”

She’s never refused to tell him what is wrong before, even when she thinks it’s silly. They’ve always, always been honest with each other. Always shared their fears. Hearing her dismiss her feelings, her fears, her pain, especially when she’s using his situation to do so hurts. “Felicity… What you feel is important,” he needs her to know that. She has to. “I want to help you too.”

He feels guilty that he’s grateful that just maybe there’s something he can give back to her, when all its felt like since the ship wreck is taking. “Seriously, what happened?”

Felicity stares at the wall, but realizes he won’t be leaving anytime soon, not when she still feels like this. She shouldn’t be adding to his list of worries, but she’s trained herself too well. He’s always the one she doesn’t keep things from, even if she’s tried to be less selfish since he lost everything.

She doesn’t want him to think less of her, but maybe he’s the one who really deserves to know the truth of what happened. “I did something stupid,” she says plainly, her eyes still fixed on the wall opposite her.

“I was frustrated with my lack of progress on…” she lets her thoughts drift to her fruitless search for him and how she’d thrown herself into another project, one she thought she could actually accomplish. “I let Cooper goad me into making a program. I created an x-axis bi-numeric algorithm to gain root access to government systems.”

Oliver frowns, trying to read between the lines. He knows Felicity had been making friends with some more intense people who shared her affinity with computers, people who could actually keep up with her, but this sounded more like cyber-criminal activity than just nerds showing off to each other.

“And you can’t just develop a program like that, you need to test it out.” There’s a little twist in her voice as she says that, parroting what they’d decided what felt like years ago but also like yesterday.

Oliver almost doesn’t need to hear the next sentence. As an expert in bad ideas, he can see this is going nowhere good. “So we did, on the Department of Education. Except, Cooper took it too far. He started erasing evidence of student debt. Writing off the loans. Because apparently, he hadn’t been listening to me when I said the algorithm gave access, but it only stayed undetected if you didn’t actually start to make changes.”

“He’s a shit listener,” she says before her breath catches and she can’t bring herself to correct her tense, not yet.

She curls her fingers around the jacket she is still holding, “I didn’t pull the plug soon enough. The FBI arrested him. Cooper took the fall for the hack and student loan stuff. Said it would be stupid for them to get both of us when he’s the one who actually did it even though it was _my_ program.”

“Cooper’s right,” Oliver says, the idea of Felicity being arrested is so far from where he thought this had been going. He hadn’t been able to get much a read on this boyfriend of Felicity’s from the couple times she’d mentioned him over the last few months, but he’s glad the guy got this much right, even if he sounds too reckless. “No point in throwing you both under the bus.”

Felicity makes a sound that’s somewhere between a laugh, a sob, and an angry scoff. Oliver hopes he never hears her make it again because it’s horrible and makes him realize her story isn’t over.

“Cooper’s dead. He _hung_ himself in jail before sentencing.” There are the tears, she’s been wondering when they’d start to fall. She’s made it until noon at least today. Progress.

Oliver has no idea what to say to that, but his heart aches for her, “Oh, Felicity. I’m sorry.”

Felicity gulps down air, her lungs suddenly too empty. “I… I can’t do this.” Felicity wraps her arms around herself, shaking again. She refuses to have a panic attack in front of him. How could she—he’s the one in danger. He’s the one fighting for his life every day. He’s the one who needs her, not the other way around. She can handle this on her own.

Breathe in, breathe out.

“Hey, look at me,” Oliver pleads. It’s the longest they’ve gone without looking at each other once being brought together and suddenly Oliver can’t take it. Everything feels wrong without her eyes meeting his own.

“No,” Felicity is shaking her head and she isn’t stopping. “I can’t.”

“Felicity.”

Something about his tone gets her turn around and red rimmed wild blue eyes are suddenly boring into him. “It’s my fault! It was my algorithm! He didn’t realize what he was doing and I didn’t explain it well enough and I let him take the fall for me and I didn’t visit him enough or try to rescue him or…”

“Come here,” Oliver just wants to pull her into his arms so the world makes sense for just a few minutes, so he can feel like he’s helping someone, anyone—especially so he can feel like he’s actually helping Felicity.

“No!” Felicity backs away from him, shaking her head as she crowds back against her desk. She’s holding up a hand to keep him away. “No! Don’t you get it! I’m gonna lose you too! I can’t find you on that godforsaken island! Nothing I do is enough, none of it ever makes a difference! What’s the point! What’s the point of being a genius when I can’t stop everyone I care from being taken away!”

“Felicity…”

“I have memorized the blueprints of your boat. I have your trip manifest. I know the name of every damn person who went down with the _Queen’s Gambit_ ,” she counts off on her fingers as she lists all the information she has and ways she’s been trying to track him down as tears continue to fall. “I have your float plan. I have _dozens_ of maps plotting where you may have wrecked and therefore ended up.”

“I’ve been studying ocean topography and drift patterns, and, and wreck salvaging. And it’s all been useless!” She glares at him, her chest heaving with frustration and the fact that she said most of that with minimal breathing. It’s the first time she’s really met his eyes since he arrived and he’s taken aback by the frantic look in them.

Felicity starts pacing, walking back and forth the width of her dorm room. It’s not very wide and so she doesn’t get far before she has to turn around. Oliver’s getting dizzy watching her. The speed at which she’s speaking isn’t helping him try to keep up either.

She lets her mind fall back into plans to find him instead of Cooper. “I’ve hacked some satellites, but island near the coast of China isn’t actually that helpful as far as narrowing it down goes. Do you know how big the Pacific Ocean is?” She stops and looks at him expectantly, before resuming her previous pacing without waiting for an actual answer. “Cuz its really, really, big. Who knows how much the storm could have messed with your trajectory!”

“I just need to crack the NSA satellites or one of the ARGUS black watch satellites,” she says, almost to herself and if Oliver wasn’t worried about her before, this would definitely have done it. “But their encryption has too much power behind it and I can’t exactly break in to ARGUS facilities to gain hard access without someone noticing and I doubt they’d understand why I need—”

“Felicity!” Oliver finally manages to shake himself out of his stupor to walk over and physically put his hands on Felicity’s upper arms in order to get her to stand still. She looks up at him, startled, as if she’d forgotten he was even there.

“I’m not,” Oliver starts, before he shakes his head. He takes a deep breath and stares into her blue eyes, “I don’t expect you to find me. Really. It’s okay.” He rubs his hands up and down a bit as he tries to let her know that he means it, that she doesn’t need to be doing any of this. That its eating her up inside and he can’t take it, can’t be responsible for that. “It’s okay.”

Felicity narrows her eyes and crosses her arms, “It's not.” Because it isn’t okay, not that she hasn’t found him yet and certainly not that he thinks she doesn’t care enough to go looking for him in the first place. “ _I_ expect me to find you.”

“Felicity, you’re smart, but you’re not a god,” he doesn’t know why he’s the one explaining this to her when she’s the smartest person he knows, but somehow, she doesn’t get that this is a waste of time. That trying to save him is a waste of her time and life. He can’t let her do this to herself for him. He’s not worth it, any of it. “You’re not trying to find a needle in a haystack, you’re trying to find one specific needle in a stack of needles! You can’t throw your life away, trying to find me. Please, I…”

 _Feel guilty enough_. She hears those words without him speaking them. But he can’t really think she won’t look, can he? “I solve mysteries and I don’t give up on people who are important to me, Oliver. That’s not who I am.”

“And I love that about you, but not at the cost of your own life, either figuratively or because you’ve been arrested by secret government agencies!” He’s working himself up into a panic because he doesn’t doubt she could do at least some of what she’s talking about, but she’s just one person. “You have to understand how much I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you because of me, because of this island. If I destroy even more lives than all the ones already been ruined.”

“Oliver…” Felicity inhales, her hand wrapping around his forearm. She’s only come a few times to him on the island and not for very long. He hadn’t been very talkative, so she’d mostly just tried to be there for him, but she’d have spoken up sooner if she knew this was what he’s been thinking. “The _Gambit_ sinking was not your fault.”

“Maybe not, but…” Oliver takes a deep breath. He doesn’t want her to know this, doesn’t want it to touch her, doesn’t want to change how she sees him, but if it’s the only way to convince her, he doesn’t care. “There are other people here. Bad people. I met some people who are helping me, but… I killed someone, Felicity.”

Felicity’s eyes widen as she gapes at him. Oliver can’t help but justify himself, at least a little, “He had a gun and he was going to kill me and Yao Fei and Shado and I stopped him. I took his gun from him and we fought and he got shot. And he’s dead now—because of me.”

Felicity knows there are other people on the island with him, dangerous people, even if she’s never seen them, but this is far more than she expected. Her mind races to catch up, but the basics she can grasp immediately. “Oliver, that is not your fault. It was self-defense.”

“He’s still _dead_ ,” Oliver says, his voice breaking and it’s his turn to look away from her.

“Oliver,” Felicity says, her hand reaching to turn his face back to hers. There’s no question how she feels about this revelation and him and he needs to know that, “Maybe it makes me a bad person, but I can’t tell you how happy I am that you lived instead of him.” The idea that she might just never get pulled to his side or vice versa one day has been giving her nightmares actually. The idea that he could have been killed and she would have just never known what happened fills her with grief of a different flavor than Cooper’s death did, but its no less potent.

He’s here though—he’s still here—and she throws her arms around him, suddenly needing to reassure herself of that fact.

Oliver returns the hug automatically, so glad that she’s safe at least. He clenches his eyes at the thought of how close she came to not being so. He also can’t quite believe she hasn’t turned him away after what he told her, that she is still willing to be around him. She still doesn’t feel close enough though, still feels unreal enough that he tries to hold her more tightly.

It’ll have to be enough. For now.

He doesn’t know how long they stay like that, but eventually their holds loosen and she pulls back enough to look up at him. Her voice is determined as she warns, “I’m not going to stop looking for you. I’ll try to be more careful and I won’t break into any government black sites, but I’m not going to stop.”

“Felicity, please…” Oliver pleads.

She shakes her head, sad she can’t give him this, but knowing she won’t be able to live with herself if she gives up.

“I looked you up after the accident,” she says. He freezes, but doesn’t look surprised, just resigned because yeah, he figured with all she’s told him so far.

“I mean, that’s obvious isn’t but…” Felicity takes a breath and her eyes lock onto his as she says carefully, “I know what your mother looks like. And your little sister.” Felicity sounds haunted and Oliver feels it, closes his eyes against the picture she’s describing. “There are pictures of them from your _funeral_.”

“Stop,” Oliver begs because he can’t take hearing that, thinking about how his mom and Speedy think they’re both dead. That there’s a gravestone back home with his name on it, next to his dad’s.

Sudden fear gripes him and the blood drains from his face. “You haven’t told them about me surviving, have you?”

“No.” Felicity knows what false hope can do to a person. What use would it be? Would they even believe her? No, the best she can do for them is to bring him home. If she even can.

“Good, I’m probably not coming back anyways.” He doesn’t add that the Oliver Queen who left one his dad’s boat died on a life raft no matter what.

Felicity hunches in on herself, wondering why his voice saying her deepest fears makes her want to overcome them that much more, before she huffs and straightens. She feels more like herself than she has in weeks as she says, “I am going to keep looking and you can’t stop me. So either you start telling me everything you know, or I’ll have to resort to other measures.”

Oliver stares down at her and he feels what little resolve he’s still holding onto crumble at the look in her eyes. “Alright, okay.” They end up sitting on her bed, leaning heavily against each other. If she’s going to do this, he’ll give her anything he can, “We only had four days left of our trip and we were on schedule as far as I know. The storm came from the north and…”

He doesn’t leave until Felicity feels solid again, her mind racing with new plans and programs to run, new ways to find him. She falls asleep soon after, exhaustion swamping her from out of nowhere.

They both sleep soundly for the first night in a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think the show technically said everything with Cooper happened in 2009, but that's the year she graduated and no way was all this happening in Spring in Boston around finals, even Felicity wouldn't have been able to pull that, so I made it be fall of Senior year instead and therefore in 2008.
> 
> From now on there will be a chapter for each year, in order with no skipping around. Also, up til now we've seen every moment they were together. With the terror of Island times, that's too frequent and no longer the case, so we'll be seeing the main moments.
> 
> Thanks so much for all your comments! They help motivate me to stay on track ;)


	8. 2009

Oliver is starting to get a better feel for what summons Felicity to him now that it happens so much more frequently on the island. Its fear, of course, like they always say, but it’s also when there’s nothing else to focus on, but the fear. When he’s running or fighting for his life, he’s scared, but there’s too much else to do, to plan and anticipate, that it’s not what he’s paying the most attention to.

Now though, as he huddles in this cave with night falling all around him, he feels the fear take more and more of his mind over. Every branch snap and animal call could be an enemy in waiting. Even though he’s not expecting anyone, even though he should be as safe as he can get, he can’t fight the fear. There are traps set all around and he’s hidden well, but it’s not enough and his mind can’t stop. Hyper alert for anything at all and he’s too tired to ignore the fear, although not enough to actually fall asleep.

He’s not surprised when she’s next to him within minutes.

“Oliver.” He feels some tension leave him at the sound of her voice for the first time since her dorm room.

When his eyes focus on her though, surprise is the most prominent emotion. “You’re blonde,” he blurts out, raising a hand to push a strand that had fallen out of her pony tail behind her ear.

Felicity blushes, re-doing her ponytail when she realizes how much has fallen out in the night. “Oh, yeah. Trying something new.” She tries to focus, to scope out where they are, but she hasn’t actually had any coffee this morning so her brain isn’t firing on all cylinders quite yet.

“It suits you,” he says, because it does.

She pulls her attention away from the makeshift shelter that surrounds them to Oliver, leaning against a large industrial looking crate, weariness etched into the new lines of his face. She still can’t get used to the beard, it makes it a little harder to read him, but this she can see plainly. “You need to sleep.” He has a rough blanket over him and the night is quiet and cool. It doesn’t seem to matter, whatever survival activities weren’t enough to knock him unconscious, and she doesn’t know why.

As if he can read the question in her eyes, he says, “I can’t. Every twig snap, the ocean, the wind, I can’t fall asleep. It didn’t used to be this hard,” he laments, fisting his hand in the blanket.

Felicity quietly sits down in the dirt next to his feet, close, but still able to see him easily. She thinks he likes the eye contact, the reminder he’s not alone. His muscles seem to lose some of their rigidity, their brittle-ness, but his eyes keep darting past her. “Why is it hard now?”

“Because I know what’s out there,” Oliver says, his voice low. “because I know I don’t know everything that’s out there. Because I got used to being with Yao Fei. It’s easier than before when he’s here. It’s harder than before when he’s not.” Felicity pulls up her right leg and wraps her arms around her knee. It’s a move he’s seen her do before and he’s suddenly aware that her pajama pants are covered in pandas. He feels another small knot in his chest loosen just looking at her.

“Since he’s not here, I’m guessing you did somethings to make the area secure?” Felicity asks.

Oliver bobs his head obliging her, “Yeah, this is one of our camps. There are traps with rope to make noises, if someone or an animal gets too close. I made sure I didn’t come straight here, I used the trees part of the way and walked in the stream for a quarter mile.” Automatically Felicity looked at his feet and she smiled when he wiggled his dry, but rather dirty toes at her. “This area’s kinda mountainous, without a lot of resources, so we only stay here for a few days at a time and no one else should really come here, except to look for us.”

“I should be safe.” Felicity hears the “as safe as I can be here” as well as if he’d said it aloud, but only nods. “I need to sleep or I’ll be tired tomorrow and then I’ll make mistakes and…”

“Hey,” Felicity can see a panic spiral coming from a mile away. Once you start panicking about how panicking is going to make things worse, you’re in real trouble. “You’ll get to sleep. Any tricks you used to use back home?”

“I don’t think there’s any warm milk around,” Oliver suggests glibly, but the corners of his lips upturn when she gives him a look. “Or a bottle of vodka.” Her eyes soften since she can at least tell that was a real thing he used to do. “Honestly, I never had much trouble sleeping before unless I had extra energy to burn. Those days I’d go for a run and that’d be enough.”

“Yeah, well, it sounds like you’ve done more than enough of that today,” Felicity says with a smile before it turns into a thoughtful frown. She doesn’t often have trouble getting to sleep, primarily because she’s been running on caffeine and overworking herself until she passes out to get through her ridiculously accelerated degree program for all of her college career up to and including now as she can almost taste the degrees that she’s so close to finishing.

When she does have trouble, it’s mostly because of worries about Oliver or regrets about Cooper or guilt about both of them or her mom. She normally plays loud music so she can drown her thoughts out with or streams something online, but it’s not like Oliver has either of those options available to him. Felicity certainly isn’t going to sing to him and she’s no Shahrazad, able to tell stories all night long.

Oliver likes to watch Felicity’s face as she tackles a problem, he finds. He knows she’s a genius, but it’s fascinating to see her in action, her brow furrowed, mouth moving silently as she puts her incredible mind to even something as ridiculous as Oliver’s inability to make his overtired, overstressed, hyper vigilant brain stop sabotaging himself by keeping him from the sleep he knows he needs. Then her face clears and he can see she’s come up with a game plan, one she’s not positive about—he remembers when she decided on her college escape plan and she isn’t as sure as she was then—but he can tell its solid enough for her to give it a shot.

“Do you know what an algorithm is?” she asks.

He blinks at her. That isn’t what he was expecting. “What?”

“Do you know what algorithm is?” she repeats, head tilted slightly to the side, assessing him.

“No. Why? I don’t…” Oliver feels like he’s back in class and hadn’t known there was a pop quiz. Felicity keeps her eyes on him and she makes a prompting gesture with her hand, a small encouraging smile on her lips. Oliver sees she isn’t going to give this up until he answers so he frowns, “Um, something to do with math? And computers? A program…?”

“An algorithm is set of instructions that a computer can interpret. It uses computer logic to tell a computer to produce a specific output when given a specific input,” Felicity begins, her voice soft and low, and she continues to talk about algorithms because it was the first thing that popped into her head when she decided she was going to try to talk Oliver to sleep. His brow is furrowed in confusion at first, and then amusement as he leans back and lets her keep talking. She can see he’s entertained by the idea of how long she might be able to talk for.

She thinks this might work because its similar enough to music or radio or TV, but also because it makes Oliver feel less alone, that he has an ally nearby, even though they both know she can’t actually do anything. He realistically has already done everything he can to make himself sleep—his body just needs to get the message.

She feels a slight thrill of victory the first time his eyes drop and his blinks get longer. She nearly fist bumps when he yawns.

She’s in the middle of describing the first algorithms she wrote in middle school when she’s finally convinced, he’s really falling asleep. Felicity only knows for sure it worked when she realizes she’s back in her dorm room.

>>>\------->

Now that the fight is over, now that he’s alone and just waiting, he can feel the fear he’s pushed to the side come creeping back. Fear for his friends, fear for himself, fear of his enemies. Of this brief respite from danger being a dream. He’s been passed out most of the last few days, which he supposes is good because its meant that any free second had been planning his escape and not making Felicity appear as she just has.

Felicity feels like each time she comes, it takes less time to spot him. Her eyes zero in on Oliver in the ruins of what looks like a cargo plane from a war that took place fifty years ago. She’s happy he’s at least sitting upright, but worried because he looks like he’s been _trampled_.

“Oliver!” Felicity nearly trips over her own feet and the roots of some tree on her way over to him.

“Hey, Felicity,” Oliver says, he actually manages a smile, even if it splits his lip. “It’s okay. I didn’t die.”

Felicity can’t help the tears that fall at that sort of reassurance. Her hands hover over him, wanting to touch, but terrified of making the pain worse. She settles her right hand against his cheek, fairly confident it’s just mud on his face and not bruising. He gives a little sigh at her touch. Her hand feels a little too cool and the pressure too light to be real, but its real enough to count.

“What happened?”

“Got captured, me and Shado. It was my fault and Shado’s the more valuable prisoner, so…” he can see by the slight flash of anger Felicity doesn’t repress fast enough that she catches his allusion to the fact that he let them use him as a punching bag to spare his friend. He knows she hates his martyr streak as she calls it, she said so the last time she was here and he had a stab wound a month ago, but he doesn’t know how to justify being selfish in this scenario. He pushes past it, “Slade broke me out so I could run here. I don’t know how long they’ll be though.”

“What’s the worst?” Felicity says.

“Concussion. Got my head slammed into….” Oliver tries to remember, but can’t. It hurts his head too much to try so he stops, “Something hard. Very hard. Gotta stay awake til they get back.”

“Then it’s a good thing I’m here,” Felicity says, trying to keep her tone light, even though all she wants to do is curl around him and take away his pain. She can’t do either though, all she has are her words.

“Normally, I’m trying to send you to sleep,” she tries for a teasing tone. This year is clearly going to be the worst of any so far, she can just tell. Last year, he and Yao Fei, had mostly kept to themselves, Oliver too green to be of any help with anything dangerous and evidently fear of starving doesn’t pull her to him the way the aftermath of violence seems to. It’s only summer and she’s already been to the island half a dozen times this year, “I don’t know what to talk about to keep you awake.”

“I’m sure you’ll think of something,” Oliver says, his head lolling a bit to the side to look at her as she sits next to him. Her presence is enough to perk him up a bit, both because he looks forward to her visits and doesn’t want to waste a second, and because it helps to have anyone with him, anyone safe that is.

Felicity picks at her pink skirt, studying it as she tries to think of what she can talk about that won’t put him to sleep. Without thinking, her mouth opens, “My mom likes pink. It’s her favorite color. Purple’s my favorite, but I like pink too.”

Oliver is paying far more attention to her than her rambling about colors deserves, his eyes intent on her own. “Dark blue,” he offers and she flushes but nods, glad he’s not calling her out for the strange and childish topic.

“And then, near the end of high school, I started to hate pink, _because_ she liked it, because of what it had started to symbolize. As if liking pink and, and pretty dresses meant I’d end up stuck in Vegas, stuck in a job like hers, a life like hers and I felt guilty, but I was so angry,” Felicity’s hand curls into a fist. “I wanted to distance myself from everything she liked so I could reassure myself I wouldn’t end up like her.”

Felicity bowed her head, “Sad like she was, for all she pretended with me. I mean, she loves me and I do think I make her happy, but I’m not sure a lot does besides things I felt were superficial and, not childish exactly, but—shallow, I guess. And I felt like a terrible daughter for thinking that, for knowing she was sad and just wanting to leave, but I still felt that way and I resented feeling guilty about it and I just, turned it all into anger—at her and the world.”

“Hence the college, ehm,” Felicity blushes and settles on, “Changes.”

“You don’t have to defend doing the opposite of what your mom wants for you to me,” Oliver points out. “I might not have given myself such an…extreme make-over, but trust me, leaning into your self-destructive tendencies upsets your mom just as much.

When he thinks back, he realizes, “I think it ended up upsetting her more than my dad. Dad could be very boy will be boys, wild youth, sow your oats or whatever the fuck. It was only the last year that he really started to get tired of it, angry I was still dicking around when he felt I should I have gotten it out of system by then.”

“Mom was upset with the partying and the tabloids and the...” he searches for the best word for “sleeping with anyone willing”. He settles on, “The indiscretions from the second they started. I think she thought college would help me focus after high school. Would make me start taking life more seriously, instead of what she saw as goofing off.”

“Instead of dialing it up to eleven?” Felicity rephrases, a smile on her lips.

“Right,” Oliver nods. “Which is part of why I did it in the first place.”

“Yeah,” Felicity agrees with a sigh.

Oliver looks at her and asks without thinking, “How’d you get it back? Back to letting yourself like pink again?”

Felicity frowns, considering the question. “It wasn’t just one thing… I liked my new style and my new friends and everything at college, but it was me sort of, aggressively being someone different than who I was before. And some of that was really me, parts of me I’d hidden or ignored. I’d always kept that anger bottled up, my intelligence too, as much as I could in high school. It was freeing to lean into it so much, but…”

“It also was an act. Sort of fake it til you make it.” Oliver nods, he knows all about that. Brazen, undeserved confidence has gotten him further than even his good looks have. He automatically reaches to message his neck as even nodding had sent a fresh pulse of pain through him. He’s glad Felicity is still studying her finger nails and doesn’t notice, she worries enough.

“I probably faked a little harder than I needed to. When, when Coop…” Felicity takes a deep breath and Oliver clasps her hand. She gives him a faint smile, trying not to feel guilty that he’s trying to comfort her when he’s the one… before she continues, “My goal had been getting out of Vegas for so long, I ended up a little lost when I finally accomplished did.”

“I needed to take a step back and figure out what I really want and who I wanted to be again. And I didn’t want to be angry anymore, it was exhausting and tended to just end with me being sad instead. The space, the years away from my mom helped too, sort of. Her other…opinions still rub me the wrong way sometimes, but her clothes are just her clothes. And I never really stopped liking pink.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” she leans back and meets his eyes again. “Some of the changes are also necessity. Like I said, I can’t be my mom so that means a stable, white collar job which means looking employable to those types of businesses. Steady paycheck, not having to check my bank account every time rent is due or obsessively timing grocery trips, is the goal.”

“And I needed a change. This may seem like the less dramatic fashion choice,” Felicity gestures at the black shirt and pink skirt combo she has on, “but its still me faking it until I make it. Its still me making myself look like an adult until I feel more like one. Look happy and well-adjusted and all that crap until I feel more like I am.

“Is it working?” Oliver asks, genuinely curious.

“I think I’ve got some people at work fooled,” Felicity says, before she tilts her head to the side with a wince, “Well, the ones I haven’t talked to for more than a few minutes and scarred with my word vomit.”

“Yeah?” Oliver looks intrigued.

Felicity doesn’t rise to the bait, “Yeah, but its only been a week, so we’ll see if that lasts.”

“Tell me about your move,” Oliver requests. “You said you went from East coast back to the West coast. Did you fly? I assume you didn’t have movers.”

Felicity narrows her eyes and mutters something that sounds suspiciously like _spoiled rich kid_ under her breath, but launches into a tirade about trying to pack all of her belongings into her car, driving across the country for a brief stay in Vegas, before finding an apartment in record time order to get away from her mother as quickly as possible.

She’s started to talk about her new job, when Oliver tenses. Felicity doesn’t hear anything, but Oliver clearly does. He groans lightly under his breath as he picks up the bow next to him, nocking an arrow and pulling his quiver closer.

“You awake, kid?” a gruff male voice that must be one Oliver recognizes as he relaxes at the sound of it, letting the bow drop.

“Yeah, I’m still alive.”

“Good to hear,” comes the accented reply and Felicity never gets to see the owner of it when she’s back in her new barren apartment, a few boxes still on the floor, feeling more alone than she expected.

>>>\--------- >

Its unusual in that there are other people nearby when she joins him. Normally its only in those few time she appears for flashes, for seconds of stark terror in a fight, that she sees the others on this island. They’ve been happening more frequently, not she thinks, because the events are happening more often, but merely because their connection to each other is strengthening.

She doesn’t think Oliver knows about the flashes though, he certainly always seems busy enough during those moments. She’s actually been rather afraid she’ll distract him and then she gets worried she’ll be so afraid of distracting him that she’ll pull him to her and he’ll get distracted that way. The only way she’s been able to deal with it is by not thinking about it as much as possible.

This time, all is quiet, and it’s clear that whatever had happened earlier, whatever had happened while she was sleeping and had pulled her into a half-his reality, half-nightmare situation a few hours ago, is over.

A slim Asian woman is sitting up on a rock, head moving enough that its clear she’s on watch. A large man who looks military is asleep in one corner of their cave and an older Asian man is a near the woman, while Oliver is somewhere in the middle of all of them, with his back propped up against rock wall their camp is built against. His bruised ribs and badly stitched wound on the right side of his chest explains why he’s not fully lying down despite it clearly being his turn for sleep.

It’s odd what physicality seems to translate when they come to each other. He’ll be cold, but warm up when his arms wrap around her. Her weight doesn’t seem to register as much, so while she’s cautious, she still climbs into his lap, carefully leaning against his left side. Instinctively, he curls around her as much as he’s able to and she can feel some of his tension bleed away. The last few visits have allowed her to break down his, mostly token, resistance to her comfort.

Her hand finds the back of his head as she runs her fingers through his long hair, “Rough day?”

He makes a small movement she’s still able to interpret as a shrug. Felicity sighs lightly, recognizing his mood. Sometimes, when she gets to him, he doesn’t want to talk. With the others around she could see why now more than usual, but she can tell it’s also just how he feels at this moment.

She wonders why she’s here this time, with his friends all nearby, but it’s not always obvious what sets off enough concentrated fear to bring her to him. The way he doesn’t want to talk also makes her think it might have to do with memories, rather than immediate fight or flight dangers on the island. But that’s fine, she’s always been more than able to speak enough for two people.

She knows other people can’t hear her when she comes like this, but her voice is still lower than usual as she begins tonight’s sleepy time computer science lecture. She always has a new topic, or a continuation of an older one. She’s not sure if she doesn’t repeat subjects for her own sake or his.

She starts, “The original computers weren’t machines, they were people. Computer was a job title: one who computes. The term dates back to the 1600s, but the modern usage is really from the 1900s onward. People, primarily women, would work in teams…”

As she chatters on, lulling him into sleep, she wonders what he retains from these nights, but she never asks. Tonight’s particularly bad, she can tell, and she’s glad it’s a Saturday so she doesn’t have to worry about the time.

She’s nearly gotten him to sleep when the woman stands up, her own bow suddenly in hard. The older man gets up nearly silently, putting down whatever he’d been working on and the two communicate with hand signals, disappearing from sight.

Oliver goes completely rigid under her for the few minutes they’re gone, all hints of sleepiness gone. He sags with relief when they return unharmed and unworried, both resuming their earlier positions with only a nod in his direction for reassurance.

When he finally does fall asleep, she’s in the middle of describing how she built her first computer and if she finds herself thinking her couch is less comfortable than his lap, well, that’s just because it’s a pretty pathetic couch.

And if Shado notices that once Oliver finally falls asleep, his arms adjust as if dropping something and he shivers, pulling them in closer to himself, she keeps her conclusions to herself.

>>\------->

“Why do people look at porn at work?” Felicity says forgoing even a “hello”. She just walks over to him mater-of-factly.

She jumps up on the container next to him, her legs fold neatly under her as she sits. She meets his eyes even as she rolls her own. She can tell his friends are on their mission today. She’d overheard a minute or so of the argument about it a few days ago. His fear for them is pulling her and so she knows there’s nothing to do until they get back because Felicity had seen the he was losing than argument even then. Besides, Felicity’s got plenty work frustration to distract him with.

Oliver manages a smile though his eyes don’t stop scanning the forest below from the vantage point in this tower hideout she’s never seen before, “Well, I guess I don’t have to ask how your day’s been.”

“Wasn’t even good porn,” Felicity grumbles. “It looked like a bad home movie from the 80s.”

That actually startles a laugh out of him and she blushes even as she smiles triumphantly at having gotten him to laugh at all. It’s not something that happens often.

It’s only after a few work stories later, that she realizes she’s not going to be going anywhere anytime soon, not with the way Oliver hasn’t looked away from the view out the window for more than a few seconds.

Felicity decides, if she’s gonna be here, she might as well get up to speed. “So…” she draws out the word enough to pull Oliver’s gaze for a few seconds. “What are the chances that she’ll be able to retrieve a working radio?”

Oliver tenses a bit, it’d probably be more except he’s already more than eighty percent tense as it is. “Better than our odds have ever been before, but not good.”

Felicity bites back a quip about his being an optimist because, yeah she gets why he’s not willing to hinge any hope on this mission. “Better than nothing.”

Oliver hums a mild agreement, but doesn’t look at her.

Felicity sighs and takes the opportunity to look at him. “What’s wrong, Oliver?”

He doesn’t look at her or say anything for a long few minutes, but eventually he tells the window, “Missions like this, they’re so close to hope of escape they make me…It makes it worse, after they don’t work out. I try not to get my hopes up, but... it’s really hard not.”

Felicity knows that’s why he never asks how her own search is going. Its why she never tells him her plans; her nights messing with Google’s satellites or her time spent hacking his mother’s secret company, the one Moira Queen uses to fund ship salvaging missions, or any of the other things she does for him. She’ll tell him when she’s dispatched a boat to his location and not a minute sooner.

“What day is it?” Oliver asks, seemingly unable to help himself.

She blinks and studies his face, gives him a chance to take the question back, but he doesn’t. “It’s Sunday. November 8th, 2009.”

Oliver nods rigidly. He is vaguely aware of the time passing and at various points they come across something with the ability to give the date or people who ended up on the island after them, it’s still a shock. “Over two years since… Thea will be fifteen soon. It’s just so…”

“Yeah,” Felicity acknowledges. She never knows how much to say about the rest of the world, in general or just his own. She doesn’t know how to say that she’s seen his mom, in person, at some corporate outreach charity event everyone at QC had been invited to. Doesn’t know what she would say about it beyond that Moira had looked like she was wearing a mask. She still hasn’t told him she’s working for Queen Consolidated, worries he might think she was over stepping boundaries or something.

“Sometimes I think about what it would be like to be back. I’ve had dreams where I’m home and everyone’s there and…” Oliver trails off and there’s a strained longing in his voice that she feels in her soul. He finally looks back at her and says, “A lot of times, you’re there too. My mom and my sister and Tommy and some friends. And you.”

Felicity doesn’t know what to say, it’s the first time either have acknowledged out loud that they could in fact meet in person, if he returns. “Would you want that?” Felicity hears herself ask, her mouth working without her brain’s permission as always.

“Yes,” Oliver says simply. “Of course.”

Felicity blushes and smiles, “It would be nice to see you without...” Felicity waves her hand in a circle and Oliver gives her a faint smile in return.

“Under better circumstances,” Oliver suggests.

“Yes, exactly.” Felicity nods and for a moment they both let that idea, that thought sink in and Felicity’s heart stutters when his smile dims and he breaks their eye contact. She can see his doubts resurface, his fears about never actually getting off the island, never seeing his loved ones again.

“Hey,” she says, reaching out to grab his hand and tangling their fingers together. It’s odd, the more they meet, the more their contact doesn’t feel like enough. She ignores that feeling for themoment and says, “We’ll make it happen, one way or another.” She’s not sure if she means getting him off the island or meeting in person. She’s not sure the distinction matters.

Oliver’s fingers tighten around her own, but it’s not enough pressure and he doesn’t meet her eyes.

They sit in silence until Yao Fei, Shado, and Slade return. The look on their faces is enough of answer. Oliver’s disappoint wipes away his fear and she’s back in her apartment, her fingers left with the sense memory of the faint pressure of his fingers. It may not have been much, but the absence of it is worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Longest chapter of the whole story.
> 
> Only two more left.
> 
> I love hearing what everyone thinks!


	9. 2010

Felicity puts her hand on Oliver’s shoulder as he carefully holds a cup of herbal tea to Shado’s lips, while Slade uses two hands to keep pressure on her wound.

After she’s emptied the cup, Oliver retreats to give the couple some privacy, sitting across the mouth of the cave. Felicity’s hand covers his own tight fist, “What happened?”

“Running low on supplies,” Oliver says bluntly. “Took a risk we shouldn’t have. Didn’t go well. Another escape route gone.”

Felicity lets out a sigh, running her hand over the tight, tense muscles of his arm, trying to soothe him as best she can. She definitely doesn’t feel the need to tell him that his mother has recovered the remains of the Queen’s Gambit, that both Moira’s best hired salvage experts and Felicity herself with satellite access have been unable to find anything useful with that information except lots of islands Oliver isn’t on and open sea.

She definitely isn’t going to say that it looks like Moira Queen is giving up the search. With the torn apart pieces of the Gambit in her warehouse, its not surprising that she might be convinced after these years that her husband and son really are dead. She’s never explicitly told him that Moira is looking, but she’s let some details of her own search slip out and its clear some of her research was piggy backed off someone else’s.

No matter how much card counting money Felicity sinks into her search, Moira has infinitely more resources so she’s left some of the search to the older woman. Moira has primarily been searching for the ship itself, rather than holding out much hope for anyone living. Felicity can respect that, Moira Queen is clearly a very realistic and practical woman, but now that’s she’s found it and nothing else, well, she’s calling off some of her search.

And its not that Felicity hasn’t been tempted to tell Moira what she knows. However, she knows for a fact that other people, vultures and frauds the lot of them, have reached out to Moira—everyone from supposed psychic mediums to shady treasure hunters—all claiming they could help her get back her missing family members or at least get closure. Moira probably wouldn’t believe Felicity. Also, Felicity’s not sure what else Moira could do to help at this point. There was a limit to what anyone can do. Besides, Oliver had made her promise.

Oliver must sense some of her inner turmoil, or at least her guilt over her own inability to provide an escape route so far. He shoves down his fear for his friend, for getting home as best he can, “Hey, its nothing worse than usual.”

“It just adds up,” Felicity finishes. Oliver nods and they sigh simultaneously. As the time goes by, Oliver is becoming more acclimated to fear and survival mentality needed for the island and she’s been pulled less often this year, for shorter spans of time. Felicity knows she should be happy he’s not as afraid anymore, but it worries her too. She hates the thought that they’ll be ambushed and he’ll die before she can come, that one day will be the last day she sees him and she’ll never know what happened.

“Yeah,” Oliver agrees. Then he shrugs, “I guess that’s what to expect from this living hell.” Then he gives a little bitter chuckle. “Or purgatory, whatever.”

Felicity furrows her brow at him. She can tell that is some sort of inside joke, but she isn’t following. Is this how he feels when she makes nerd culture references?

“Lian Yu, purgatory,” Oliver says, correctly interpreting her confused look as a request for him to elaborate. “Because apparently that’s literally where I’ve been stuck.

Felicity blinks and repeats the words, “Lian Yu?”

Oliver nods. “That’s the name of this island, according to Shado. I thought it was just a joke her dad used to make. He’d translated it for me, but I hadn’t realized it was the actual name. He’d heard the name before he was exiled here and it’s how Shado was able to find him.” It’s only been a few weeks since this has been explained to him, during Yao Fei’s memorial service, as none of them liked to talk about life before the island. “Not that it did her much good, I think Yao Fei would rather she never came, then she’d be safe like her sister on the mainland.”

Felicity hears him, but her mind is already processing this information at a rapid pace and evidently Oliver notices. He tenses and ask cautiously, “Can you do something with that?”

Felicity takes a few seconds to respond but when she looks up, her eyes are filled with determination, “I can do anything with a name.”

>\------>

Felicity paces in her living room. Its been an hour since she hit send on the final email, thanking them for their acceptance of the job.

The problem is that she needs to talk to him, but he isn’t afraid and she has no idea when he might be. So she has to bring him here, has to cast aside her carefully honed calming techniques that she perfected so as not to distract him from island survival. It’s turning out to be harder than she expects.

She focuses on her fears that she won’t be able to tell Oliver the message in time, that he’ll miss his rescue. That he’ll be trapped on that island forever. That one day she’ll just cease to see him and it’ll be because she couldn’t get to him in time.

Its strange, he hasn’t come to her in years, but she recognizes the feeling. The awareness that he’s with her.

She turns and finds him in her living room, looking just as out of place as she feels on the island. His rough clothes, sunburned skin, and long hair make him look more like a movie extra than a real person.

Still, her fear of not getting this message to him is enough to have her start talking immediately, “You need to build a pyre on the north shore of Lian Yu and be ready to light.”

“What?” Oliver is trying to keep up with his sudden appearance at Felicity’s side. He’s distracted by trying to figure out what is scaring her and by taking in her apartment, the sight of civilization always refreshing after years of forest. It’s cozy and bright, her apartment. He doesn’t see any threat though, any invading person or natural danger. She is clearly not just waking up, the view outside suggesting it was almost sunset, so no nightmares to frighten her are likely.

“Someone’s coming for you,” Felicity says, barely able to believe the words herself. “In a good way, not in a murder-y way, I mean.”

His gaze snaps to her own eyes, “What?”

“I found the island,” she says, pride and hope breaking into her voice. She tries to stay focused, to remind herself it doesn’t mean anything until he’s actually back home. “And a boat should come by in a few days. I don’t know how long it will take but they set sail today.

“How?” Oliver stares at her, never more sure in his life that this genius woman can’t be real.

“Too long to explain, I don’t know how long I can keep you here.” He can see its getting dark out her windows. “Focus! You need to be ready for them. It was all I could do to have someone sail by the island.” It had taken her longer than she was comfortable with, the language barrier more of an issue than she’d like, but she was finally able to arrange everything. “They don’t know they’re coming to pick you up so you need to get their attention. Got it?”

“Yes,” Oliver’s nodding, his mind finally catching up with the reality of her words. “I understand.”

Then he shakes his head because… “Felicity, you… You’re remarkable, Felicity Smoak.”

Felicity finally cracks a smile, a pleased and triumphant blush spreading across her face. “Thank you for remarking on it.”

“Felicity,” he starts to say something, something more to communicate what this means to him, what she means to him, but she’s already gone. He stares at the forest that comes back into focus around him and squares his shoulders. Felicity did what she needed to do: give him a chance. He doesn’t plan on screwing it up.

>\------>

She’s been on edge for weeks, but the relief that fills her when she sees him, illuminated by fluorescent hospital lights, is overwhelming. “Oliver!”

He sees her and actually grins, scooping her up in his arms to hug her, twirling them around.

“I’m so glad you’re safe,” she says and for the first time in years she knows its true. Safe. How long has it been since she wasn’t constantly worried about him being in danger? It feels like a dream. Her hands end up on his face and head, running over his newly shorn hair and stubble in disbelief.

“Felicity,” he says, smiling. He pulls her back in, “Thank you.”

“I can’t believe my plan worked,” Felicity says into his shoulder.

“I can’t believe I ever doubted you.” Oliver remembers when the boat came over the horizon, remembers waking up Slade and Shado, who’d spent the last few days annoyed with his insistence on staying on the north side of the island instead of moving around at their usual pace for safety.

They had quickly assembled a pyre from the dry wood Oliver had subtlety been accumulating over the recent days. When the boat got close enough, they’d been able to light it in a dramatic enough fashion as to attract the vessel’s attention. It had felt like days for it to get close enough to shore for them to send out a row boat and pick them up.

“Did you hire that photography guy?” Oliver asks. “Is that how you did it?”

Felicity nods against him before they pull back enough to look at each other again. Oliver settles her back down on her feet and she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. “Once I found the island, I contacted that Australian photography student studying abroad in China. Played the part of a wealthy American who loves obscure, uncharted island photography and sent him a trip map, telling him to get good shots of any islands he came across, especially if they weren’t on any maps. He was skeptical at first, but I paid him half up front and then he didn’t really care. Same with the boat.”

Oliver just laughs, shaking his head at her. Unfortunately, now he’s remembering saying good-bye to Shado and Slade, promising they can visit him any time they want, but knowing their friendship was primarily over. The rest of the trip home was…

Felicity notices the way his face sobers, and she asks in a gentle voice, “Why am I here?”

Oliver almost wants to brush it off, his current fears seem so much more irrational than the tangible fears of the island. It only takes one second of looking in Felicity’s eyes before it all comes out, “They flew me the rest of the way home once I was able to make it clear who I was and I fell asleep. Had a nightmare and when I woke up…” He hadn’t known where he was or who he was with. With his friends missing and so many strangers and an unfamiliar setting, he’d lashed out on instinct.

“They had to sedate me,’ he admits, embarrassed and also unnerved by the lengths that it had taken. “Woke up in this hospital room,” he gestures at the room they’re in. “The doctor says I’m back in Starling. Once I was awake and understood that, he said that my family’s coming pick me up.”

Felicity waits patiently, because she can tell he’s almost gotten to what his fear is. Oliver swallows heavily, “What if they don’t….” What if they reject me, he thinks but can’t say. He shrugs helplessly. “I’m not the same Oliver Queen that left.” If anything proved that, it was the trip home. What if his family didn’t want the new him?

Understanding fills her eyes and she smiles, giving his shoulder a squeeze. “They will. Because they’re your family and they love you,” she says, trying to make him listen to her words. She can tell he’s hearing them, but not letting himself accept them as truth. So she cracks a smile, “And if they don’t, screw them and enjoy the indoor plumbing at least.”

He laughs and squeezes her shoulder in thanks, for the reassurance and her attempt at lightening the mood.

Felicity’s grin widens because now she’s on a roll, “Hell, the food benefits alone. Pizza and milkshakes and steak. Coffee. Urgh, that’s the real miracle—that you lasted this long without coffee.”

“Is that the reason you couldn’t have lasted?” Oliver teases back.

“No, the lack of wifi is what would’ve gotten me in the end,” Felicity replies before switching back to her list. “Heating. Air conditioning. I mentioned showers, right?”

“I did enjoy my hospital shower,” Oliver admits.

“And I’m sure Oliver Queen has a ridiculous shower back home with lots of different settings and marble and faucets.” Felicity blushes and holds her hands, suddenly backtracking, “Not that I’ve pictured your shower. Or you in it. For any reason, except maybe that its probably fancier than any bathroom I’ve ever been in.”

Oliver is chuckling along with her rambling. It reminds him of nights falling asleep to her various lectures on computers. And she’s not wrong, he loves feeling clean, really clean for the first time in years. “Running water is pretty great.” He rubs his chin, “And so is being able to shave.”

“I bet,” Felicity says, studying his jawline. Forget his bathroom, the man himself looked chiseled out of marble. “The beard and long hair were not a good look on you.”

“Yes well, I’m sure the mud didn’t help either,” he points out.

“True, true,” Felicity agrees, before she strokes her finger along the edge of his cheek. “Its going to go fine with your family. They know you’ve been through some crazy stuff, they’ll know that will have changed you. I bet they’ve changed too, after everything, but you still love them, you still can’t wait to see them, right?”

“Right,” Oliver agrees, because she is. She always is. His mom is someone whose husband died, who thought her son was dead for nearly three years. His sister is fifteen now. Of course, they’ve changed too. But nothing could change how he feels about them.

“They’re all going to be overjoyed to see you,” Felicity reassures him. “I promise.

“And what about you?” Oliver finally brings himself to ask, the secret words he’s been trying to hold in, now that he feels better reuniting with his family and friends.

Felicity’s brow furrows as she looks up at him in confusion, “What about me?”

Oliver takes a deep breath, needing to ask before he lost his nerve, “Are you going to see me?

Felicity’s eyes widen and he can almost see how surprised she is, how she almost takes a step back, her hand dropping from his face, “Oliver…”

He leans closer, “I mean, you know exactly where I am now. And I’m safe, thanks to you and I…”

“Oliver?” A woman’s voice interrupts them.

Felicity sees Oliver tense, shutting his eyes in recognition. Felicity knows its someone he loves before she peaks around him and sees his mother, a look of shock and cautious hope on her face. Felicity steps back, not wanting to get in the middle of Oliver’s first reunion with his family.

He turns slowly and stares at his mom. God, she looks the same as she did the last time Oliver saw her, a lifetime ago. “Mom.”

Moira takes a few steps over to him and he mirrors them. Then he hesitates after a step, as he remembers everything he’s been through and had to do. His mom pauses for second too, looking him over. Oliver worries she can see everything and wonders what she thinks about the damaged son she’s gotten back.

“Oh, my beautiful boy,” Moira says and then she’s embracing him. He’s caught up in the moment and lets his Mom’s familiar words soothe him. God, he’d missed her so much.

Felicity fades as he sinks into his mother’s embrace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter to go, although, I've been thinking about writing an epilogue--we'll see!
> 
> Thanks again for all your comments and kudos :)


	10. 2011

He’s pacing in his office, focusing so hard that he almost doesn’t notice when his plan to bring her to him works.

“Oliver?” Her voice is confused and worried. When he turns, her face reflects the same emotions, but he can’t help the relief he feels at seeing her. “What’s wrong?”

“Felicity!” He pulls her into his arms because it’s been too long, months since he last saw her in his hospital room.

“Oliver, it’s alright, I’m here,” Felicity tries to reassure him, while also looking around for what might be causing him to feel afraid in Starling. It just looks like a private office in what she assumes to be the club she knows he’s started with Tommy. “What’s going on?”

“I thought I’d never see you again,” he says into her shoulder, his voice a little desperate as the words come out without his meaning them to. He tenses when he realizes what he revealed, but doesn’t let go.

“Oliver…” Felicity says, relaxing when she realizes what he means, that missing her, that fear of not seeing her is what brought her here. She’s impressed he’s done what she did to warn him about the boat coming for him and secretly pleased he’s apparently missed her this much. She tightens her arms around him, a wave of affection overwhelming her. For all she’s glad he’s out of danger, she misses him too.

She does pull back, needing to meet his eyes, trying to think of how to best comfort him.

Oliver lets her, blinking down at her and his fears overflow. “You said,” Oliver starts. “On the island, I mean. You said that you wanted to meet. Unless…” Oliver swallows suggesting what he’s about to say is what he’s really afraid of, “Was that just to make me feel better?’

“Oliver, no,” Felicity rushes to reassure him, running her hand up and down his arm in what she hopes is comforting manner. “Of course not.”

Its clear he’s not really listening though. Oliver’s already shutting down so fast, backtracking so quickly she feels like she can see him disappearing, “It’s okay, if you did.”

Felicity closes her eyes against the look in his own, Oliver’s always offering people outs when it comes to caring about him. She hates that he’s offering her one now. She needs him to listen her so she opens her eyes again, staring intently into his, “Oliver, that’s not it at all.”

Oliver feels some of his tension dissipate at the truth in her words, but it’s not enough. “Then what is?” Oliver presses because he needs to know.

Felicity takes a deep breath, because anything he comes up with will be worse than the truth at this point. She hadn’t realized her reluctance to meet in person would get to him like this. “I didn’t think you really wanted me to be with you,” she says gently. “Where you are. For…” she swallows and corrects herself, “In person. Like that.”

“Why would I have asked if I didn’t? Of course I do,” Oliver is staring at her like he doesn’t understand why she would be saying this.

“Really?” she asks, unable to keep herself from second guessing, not him, but his wanting of her.

“I always want to be where you are,” Oliver says, his face solemn and honest. His gaze doesn’t waver.

“But…” Felicity’s brow furrows. “You have your family back, and Tommy, and all the…”

“And I’m so happy to see them all again, I am,” Oliver says, still not sure where she’s going with it, but realizing she needs him to respond, to reassure her of…something. He’s not sure what, but he gives it his best shot.

“It’s hard, trying to get them to realize I’ve changed, how I’ve changed, but we’re getting there, slowly.” He looks down at her, smooths his hands over her upper arms, “But you’re the one who knows all of me. You’re the one who’s been with me the whole time. I miss _you_.”

“I miss you too,” Felicity replies automatically because she does, so so much.

“Then let’s meet, in person,” Oliver pleads.

“You really want me to come?” Felicity can’t help but ask one more time. Her eyes lock onto his and she tries to get him to hear her when she says, “Because you’ll be stuck with me if I do.” Sometimes all Felicity feels like she’s done these past few years is feel Oliver slip through her fingers. If he gives her permission to be around him in real life, she’s not going to be able to let go.

He just smiles back at her, like the idea she could scare him away with that, when it’s all he wants is too ridiculous to even contemplate. “I want you here, Felicity,” his voice is sure and confident. “Please.”

“Okay,” she agrees, before dropping her eyes and pressing her forehead against his shoulder, the relief at having finally made the decision leading her to attempt to draw some strength from him. “Okay.”

She vanishes from his arms the second Oliver truly believes her and the fear of never seeing her again vanishes, severing the connection pulling them together. Oliver sits down heavily in his office chair at the club, knowing he’s said what he wanted to. All his sleepless nights add up and when his worries abate, it leaves him strangely exhausted. The ball is in her court now.

>>>\------>

She’s gotten glimpses of the club before, slivers of flashes whenever Oliver is startled or has flashbacks. Their connection is still so sensitive after the island and it’s easier than even to reach out to one another, instinctive, but nothing for longer than a few seconds.

Besides, she did her research, the above-board kind and the not so much, on Verdant. Felicity goes to the employee entrance, punches in the right code, and slips inside.

She tries to act like she belongs, her shoes clicking with a confidence she doesn’t feel. She keeps excuses running through her head for why she’s here, but she never actually runs into anyone else. It’s probably just because mid-afternoon isn’t exactly prime time for even a club as popular as Verdant. She only makes one wrong turn, before she’s outside his office door. She steels herself and then gives three quick knocks before pushing open the door.

Oliver’s at his desk and looks like he just woke up, rubbing the back of his head and blinking in the subdued light of his office. He still isn’t sleeping well, so he grabs sleep whenever he can. “Tommy? I—”

Felicity is standing there, in the doorway to his office, slowly letting the door shut behind her. It makes a soft click as it shuts and Oliver’s brain tries to keep up with what that means.

She’s here. Felicity Smoak is actually standing in his office, in the same room as him, and he can tell that she’s here, in person. She’s wearing the same deep purple long sleeved shirt and dark jeans she was wearing earlier, tugging on a dangling silver earing with one hand while the other adjusts her ponytail.

“Hi, Oliver,” she says softly and even that sounds different somehow, like it’s really meeting his ears instead of just in his mind.

“Felicity,” he breathes. She’s here. He’s wondered if he would be able to tell, but he doesn’t know why he ever doubted. Their meetings always had a faint dream-like quality to them that never really went away and everything about this moment says _this is reality_ with quiet surety he revels in.

She leans back slightly on the door, not trying to leave, but for support as she takes him in too, for the first time in the flesh. As she hears him say her name. No one else has ever said it like that before.

She steps forward, called by her name on his lips, wondering if she can make him say it like that again. Like she, her presence, is a revelation.

“You really came,” he says, standing up.

Her smile softens, “Of course. When have I ever broken a promise to you?”

“Never,” he replies quickly, moving out from behind his desk, as if in a daze.

Her breath catches at his surety, the heavy weight of his belief and trust in her settling over her like a cloak. Still, she manages to quirk a smile, trying to keep the moment from getting too overwhelming. “Exactly.”

“Felicity,” he can’t seem figure out anything else to say. It seems to be enough because suddenly she’s in his arms.

They’re in the middle of the room, so he must have moved too, but he doesn’t remember making the conscious decision. His arms wrap around her, behind her shoulders and around her waist, while hers go around his neck. She’s so warm and present against him, he doesn’t know how he ever thought their meetings before could have been enough.

Oliver can’t stop running his hands over her, over her back, her upper arms, she’s so gloriously present in his arms. He suppresses a shiver when he feels her doing the same.

“How are you here so quickly?” he blurts out to distract himself, pulling back enough to look her in the eye.

“Well,” Felicity says, tilting her head in mock contemplation, a teasing smile playing at her mouth. “I do live in Starling.”

Oliver blinks down at her, “You do?”

“Yeah,” she nods. “A couple of the places I applied to before graduating were based back out here on the West Coast.” She smirks, “I _may_ have had some alternative motivating factors for making sure I looked into those based near Starling specifically.”

Oliver smiles back, “Oh, did you?”

“Yup, and while Wayne Enterprises made a compelling offer…” Felicity tries not to laugh at the offended look on his face, “It wasn’t the best.”

“You deserve the best,” Oliver replies easily, without hesitation.

Felicity blushes, “Good thing Queen Consolidated agreed with you.”

Oliver stares at her, “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, I hope you don’t mind.” She feels weirdly self-conscious about working for his family company, worries it might be over stepping boundaries and so she’s been careful never to mention where specifically she works.

“Of course not!” Oliver says. She’s been so close and he had no idea. Of course, he purposely didn’t looked her up out of respect for her decision to stay away, but still… “I just—why come here and work at QC if you didn’t want to….”

“I did,” Felicity says, her hesitation about meeting in person was never about what she wants. “I’m here now, aren’t I?”

“Yes,” he nods and she can see him try to keep from asking further questions, that he doesn’t want to risk pushing her away, that he’s afraid she’ll leave.

But she can see he still doesn’t get it and she wants him to. She doesn’t want him second guessing the time they spend together, always thinking she’ll vanish as she used to, even if it was beyond her control before.

She searches for the right words, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, as she stares at his shoulder. “So much of my mind was focused on getting you home, that once we did, I felt…” She frowns, “Nothing felt sure anymore.”

“I… It seemed like once the nightmare was over, everything would go back to normal.” She looks back up at him, “But we’re not part of normal. We used to only see each other every few years, and I thought you might want to go back to that. That once your life got back on track, you’d want this part to go back to normal too. I didn’t want to remind you of the worst times in your life.”

“Felicity…” Oliver’s already shaking his head. “No, no. You don’t remind of the bad parts, you remind me I was never truly alone, you remind me that someone was fighting for me against impossible odds, even when I was sure I didn’t deserve it.”

“Oliver,” Felicity runs her hand up and down his arm, giving his bicep a reassuring squeeze. “Of course you deserved it.”

“You have been the best part of my life for the last few years,” he tries to put all his confidence in these words, willing her to believe him. “And I think you could be the best part of my life for the rest of it.”

Felicity’s breath catches at what she sees in his eyes, “Oliver….”

“Felicity.” Oliver knows he’s no good with words, can see she’s still not completely following him, still doesn’t believe him. So he stops using his words and kisses her.

He catches her lips with his softly, his hand coming up to hold her face gently, trying to express the big complicated things he feels for her with this simple gesture. She must understand somehow because she kisses him back, her hand trailing up to rest at the back of his neck, keeping him close.

The kiss intensifies when her mouth opens and he sucks lightly at her bottom lip, before slipping his tongue into her mouth. She sighs against his mouth and his grip on her reflexively tightens. She revels in the feeling of him in her arms, so firm and warm under her hands.

They pull apart briefly only to dive back in, the passion and tension ramping up as they clutch at each other, unable to help it after spending so much of their lives being pulled away from each other against their will.

Oliver blindly walks them over to the couch and sits down, pulling her into his lap. He never wants to get up again. It feels so right for her to be there, for them to be together like this. He can’t remember when he first started to fall in love with her, he doesn’t know that it matters. All that matters is here and now.

Oliver never wants to be apart from her again. Luckily, Felicity seems inclined to agree.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you may have noticed, I extended the chapter count because I've decided to write an epilogue. So while this is the final chapter of the main story, bonus epilogue fun will go up next week. 
> 
> I hope everyone liked the story's finale!
> 
> Thanks for all your encouragement and comments!!!


	11. Epilogue (2011)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little on the later side but i managed to finish off this epilogue today. Please forgive any extra errors--this ended up being way longer and taking more time than I thought so my editing was a little hastier than usual.

Felicity looks around, mouth slightly agape, as they walk into the Queen manor, taking in the priceless artwork and way even this entry room just screams wealth.

“Why are there so many statues?” she whispers to an amused Oliver.

“Relax,” Oliver says, smiling at how nervous Felicity is just being the foyer of his house. He throws an arm around her shoulders, running a hand down her arm.

“I am the appropriate amount of nervous,” Felicity hisses, refusing to be distracted by how warm and solid he is against her, regardless of how wonderful it feels. “There’s nothing in my house that if I accidentally knocked it over, would cost the same as the house itself!”

“Technically,” Oliver points out as he gestures to the few little statuettes on the table against the wall. “None of these are equal to the value of the house.”

“They would be for a normal house!” She retorts, elbowing him in the side. “You know what I mean.”

Oliver rolls his eyes, but knows she’s trying to divert her nerves about meeting his family for the first time by freaking out about his house. He draws her into a little coat nook down the hall, and plants his hands on her shoulders, “It’s gonna be fine, Felicity.”

“It’s not though,” Felicity protests. “I’m going to accidentally insult your mother or bring up sex somehow and then Walter’s gonna fire me while your sister uploads the whole thing to Snapchat with hilarious, but cutting captions.”

Oliver can’t help but smile at her doomsday scenario and even she can’t help but give a small smile in return. “Even if all that happened, it wouldn’t change a thing between us, you know that. We exist with or without them, always have and always will.”

Felicity’s smile deepens at his sincerity, “But they’re important to you. I want them to like me.”

“I know,” he replies, wanting to reassure her. “But you’re not going to be on your own, I’ll be right there next to you.”

“And you promise to step on my foot if I start spouting innuendo in front of your mom?” Felicity asks, face serious.

“Of course,” Oliver replies solemnly. “What kind of boyfriend do you take me for?”

The corners of Felicity’s mouth lift further at the word, loving something so simple but so tangible for their relationship. “Okay, alright.” She takes a deep breath and doesn’t even flinch at the sudden sound of voices nearby. She looks up at him, “It’s just always been us, you know? It’s a little overwhelming to have all these other people around.”

“I know,” Oliver agrees because it is. He also knows that they’ll keep putting it off to stay in their own little world if they back out now. So he smirks, “I’m the one who said we should just forget the party and go up to my room instead.”

“Oliver!” Felicity swats playfully at his arm and gestures down at the navy blue dress she’s wearing. It’s her favorite—with an open back that had Oliver running his hand over her the moment he saw it. “I spent way too much time to getting ready to throw it away without even setting foot in there.”

Oliver catches the implication in her words, his eyebrows raising, “Does that mean I have a chance of persuading you to ditch the party early?”

“You can be very persuasive…” Felicity allows, her eyes twinkling up at him.

“Challenge accepted,” Oliver says with a self-confident smirk. “But until then…” he holds out his hand.

Felicity clasps it with a determined look in her eyes. “Let’s go.”

Oliver leads her back through the halls, pulling her a bit behind him, before they get to the ballroom. As soon as they walk in, a voice calls out for him.

“Oliver!” Walter says when he spots his stepson. “Good, good; you’re here. Your mother was worried you’d be late.”

“I told her I’d be here on time, even though I had to pick up my date.” Oliver replies as he puts his arm on her back to usher her from behind him.

Walter blinks as he tries to place the pretty blonde woman with Oliver, having been unaware he was even bringing a date. Then her face clicks in his mind, “Miss Smoak?”

“Mr. Steele!” Felicity says, almost vibrating with nerves, “Hi, hello. How are you?”

“Fine, good. I didn’t realize….” It’s the first time Felicity’s ever seen Walter at a loss for words. His brow furrows as he looks between them in confusion. “I was not aware you two knew each other.”

“Felicity helped me with some tech problems after I got back,” Oliver says, testing out the semi-plausible story Felicity and he had come up with for how they met. The real story was too personal and complicated. Soulmates were rare enough that no one should assume that without any direct evidence, but they still did need something to tell people before rumors started spreading.

“Yup,” Felicity nods, her smile a little over bright to Oliver, but hopefully not as obvious to someone she didn’t know as well. “You know how hopeless Oliver can be with technology.”

“Right.” It was clear Walter did not know. In fact, he was pretty sure he could count on one hand the number of times Oliver had been at QC since he’d come home, let alone wandered about looking for computer help.

“And we became friends,” Oliver continues.

“Yup, that’s right,” Felicity forcibly stops herself from nodding again. “Friends. BFFs, really.”

That makes Walter frown and raise an eyebrow, “I thought Tommy Merlyn held that particular title.”

“Right,” Felicity agrees, cursing herself for overcompensating on their story. “Which is why I decided to be his girlfriend instead.” Felicity slips her hand into Oliver’s and gives it a squeeze, trying to ground herself, before she hastily qualifies, “Oliver’s girlfriend, not Tommy’s, of course.”

“Yes,” Oliver adds unnecessarily, with a warm smile directed down at Felicity.

“Congratulations,” Walter says, seemingly not knowing what else to say. He really only knows Felicity Smoak from the few times he’s met her at work. She was more cheerful than other IT analysts but just as awkward. Neither affected his assessment of her ability or intellect and he’d quickly made her his preferred contact for problems and made a note to keep an eye on her, especially when he’d seen her qualifications.

While she’s not someone he’d thought the old Oliver would be interested in, or vice versa if he was being honest, they actually look rather good together and he can’t help approving of his step-son’s upgrade in taste. “Miss Smoak certainly is a very lovely young woman; you would be hard pressed to do better than her.”

“I know,” Oliver replies just as easily, with a wider, more adoring smile.

“Thank you,” Felicity says, surprised by the compliment.

“Of course, Miss Smoak.” Walter checked his watch, “You’ll have to excuse me though; a few last-minute preparations still need to be seen to. Please enjoy the party,” he says waving them further into the ballroom.

“Thanks, Walter,” Oliver says and Felicity echoes the sentiment.

Walter walks past them, likely to find Moira, and the couple ventures further into the ballroom.

“Breathe,” Oliver teases as he presses a kiss to her lips. “See that went fine.”

“One down, three to go,” Felicity mutters under her breath, linking their arms more closely together, refusing to let go of the hand she was still holding.

Oliver shakes his head at her dramatics, running his thumb over the back of her hand, successfully drawing her eyes up to his. He smiles indulgently, “How about we get some shrimp puffs?”

Felicity’s eyes lit up, “Yes, please.”

**> >\----->**

“Ollie, I can’t believe you’re here in the flesh.” Oliver looks up from where he’s getting drinks to see Tommy.

“Hey Tommy, you got roped into coming to this too?” Oliver says, leaning against the bar.

“Of course. The real question is: where have you been?” Tommy keeps his voice light, but he is genuinely curious and wary of Oliver disappearing in a way he never was before the island. He thought Oliver’d gotten over his need to avoid everyone he cared about for days on end a few weeks ago. He looks fine, but something’s off with him and that’s enough to make Tommy nervous. “You’ve barely responded to a text in the last few days, bailed on the club every night this week. What’s going on?”

Oliver opens his mouth to answer, feeling sheepish for making his best friend worry, when they’re interrupted.

“Oliver! There you are!” Felicity is actually a little out of breath when she dashes over to them, her hand landing on Oliver’s arm. She’s only looking up at him as her eyes narrow, “Your mom almost cornered me alone and you _promised_ that wouldn’t—” Tommy must move enough to get her attention, because she abruptly notices him standing in front of Oliver and looking a mix of surprised and entertained. “Oh!” Felicity flushes, looking back and forth between them. “Sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt you and Tommy.”

“No, its fine,” Oliver is quick to reassure her, smiling and covering her hand on his arm with his own. It takes him a second to look back over at Tommy, “I was just explaining to him—”

“Where the hell he’s been the past few days,” Tommy finishes, before a grin breaks over his face. “But I’m guessing he’s been with you.” He holds out his hand, taking in the blonde woman who seems so familiar with his—since the island—perpetually single best friend. “Tommy Merlyn, Ollie’s best friend, but you already seem to know that.”

“Felicity Smoak,” Felicity says, taking his outstretched hand with a similar grin. “Nice to finally meet you.” Because it is, beyond his important to Oliver, she’s also pretty sure the last time she saw him was in a hospital bed. Then she realizes how weird that 'finally' might sound and she adds, “Oliver’s told me all about you. Obviously, how else would I know about you?”

“Has he now?” Tommy smirks at Oliver, who automatically rolls his eyes. “Because I have no idea who you are, except perhaps a very attractive kidnapper.”

“Tommy,” Oliver says, exasperated. “Felicity is my girlfriend.”

That pulls Tommy up short and he stares at Oliver, “Since when? Since a few days ago when you vanished off the face of the planet?”

“Yes,” Oliver replies bluntly, knowing his friend hates when he doesn’t elaborate. Oliver can’t begin to explain Felicity and he doesn’t want to, its private. Besides, Tommy’s basically right, that is when they got together officially. Still, he feels he owes him something so he shrugs, “We’ve known each other for a while now though.” He and Felicity trade knowing smiles.

“Hold on,” Tommy’s eyes narrow. “Is she why you’ve turned down every girl I’ve sent your way for the past few months?”

“Tommy!” Oliver protests.

Tommy gives Felicity a little bow of respect. “Very impressive, Miss Smoak.”

Felicity rolls her eyes, “I don’t make Oliver do anything he doesn’t want to do.” Then she blushes, “I mean—”

“I bet you don’t,” Tommy replies with a grin. “Nice to meet you. Really.” Because looking at the two of them, Tommy is able to nail down what seems different about Oliver—he’s happy. Tommy’s always on board for anything that makes his friend happy. He meets Oliver’s eyes and can see that his approval comes across when Oliver’s smile widens. He looks back at the woman who's managed to make his friend happy, “So tell me about yourself, Miss Smoak. Something tells me you didn’t meet Oliver at our club.”

**> >\----->**

Eventually, Tommy is pulled away so Oliver and Felicity relocate to a tall table with some of the hors d’oeuvres that Felicity had picked up at the buffet.

“Mom alert,” a sixteen-year-old girl says as she comes to stand beside her brother. She peers around Oliver to look over Felicity with interest. “She’s heading this way and not happy that you decided to spring your new girlfriend on us without even mentioning she existed.” She reaches past Oliver, “Thea Queen.”

“Felicity Smoak. Nice to meet you. Sorry for the last-minute notice. I didn’t mean to—”

Thea waves her off and grins up at her brother, “I’m sure its Ollie’s fault.”

“Hey!” Oliver protests, but doesn’t get further than that as Moira Queen herself makes an appearance, locking eyes with her son as she comes over.

“Oliver!” Moira says, a false smile on her face as she takes in the mildly guilty look on her son’s face, glad she can still strike a bit of motherly fear in her grown son. He looks just like he did the few times he thought he was sneaking out late and she’d decided to confront him. “Imagine my surprise when Walter said you’d brought along a guest you failed to inform me about.” At the word guest, her eyes had switched over to Felicity, causing her to stiffen at the calculating gaze, before her eyes had moved back to her errant son.

“Mom,” Oliver starts to say before she cuts him off again.

“Moira Queen,” she introduces herself, fixing and keeping her gaze on the woman her son is apparently dating. To say she’d been surprised when Walter had informed her Oliver—who in the last year prior to the island had brought along a different date to every function she’d convinced him to attend and since the island had come single to every gala—had introduced someone as not only his date, but his girlfriend, would be an understatement. She intends to find out exactly who this girl is that seems to be breaking the mold.

“Hi, Mrs. Queen,” Felicity squeaks because yeah, this is exactly what she’s been dreading. Maybe they should have done the family dinner or a party next month so there’d have been more notice. Too late now. “I’m Felicity Smoak. Is it Mrs. Queen? Or Mrs. Steele? Or Mrs. Queen-Steele. You seem like the kind of woman that would hyphenate. Not that I mean anything by that, just that—”

“Mrs. Queen is fine,” Moira mercifully cuts off the ramble and Felicity’s mouth shuts with an almost audible click. Moira’s eyes track the movement of Oliver wrapping an arm around her lower back to pull her closer in silent support. She thinks the easy familiarity between the couple is the most surprising thing so far. “Good to meet you. Walter tells me that you work in QC’s IT department.”

“Yes,” Felicity replies, trying to aim for single syllables in order to prevent a ramble.

“She’ll be running it in a couple years,” Oliver said, pride clear in his voice.

“Hush,” Felicity says, elbowing him lightly.

“Is that so?” Moira catalogues each little exchange the two have, the silent communication that seems too seamless for a couple only together such a short time. 

“Felicity graduated summa cum laude from MIT with a double masters in computer science and cyber security,” Oliver replies with a proud smile. He’s been wanting to get the chance to talk her up—both to help her make a good impression on his critical mom, but also to brag that he managed to convince a literal genius to date him.

Moira hadn’t been aware Oliver even knew what “summa cum laude” meant. “Very impressive. It seems like your talents may be wasted in our IT department.”

“Thank you,” Felicity says with a blush. “I’m happy in my current position, but look forward to any opportunities for advancement.” The words are rehearsed, from her performance review meeting a few weeks ago. She wants to impress Moira as both Oliver’s mom and as the CEO of the company she works for. In this moment, CEO Moira Queen is less intimidating than Oliver’s Mom, which is the first time she’s ever thought that. “I’ve entered a project proposal to be considered for the innovation initiative that I hope is worthwhile.”

“You did? Which one?” Oliver asks, having remembered her talking about some of her ideas when visiting him on the island. At the time, she’d only brought them up hypothetically, implying that she had other priorities, like finding him, to focus on and therefore no time for extra work projects. He’s glad that she’s been able to dedicate her time to other things now that she doesn’t have to focus on saving him. “The one regarding improving QC’s encryption protocols or the one about mobile device security and applications?”

Felicity smiles at him in surprise, “So you do listen when I talk. And here I thought I was just putting you to sleep.”

“You know how long it takes me to fall asleep, how could I not retain at least some of it?” Oliver teases back. “You didn’t answer the question though. Or did you submit both?”

“I managed to finish both in time,” Felicity admits.

“I’ll be sure to let our COO know to keep an eye out for your proposals,” Moira says, watching their eyes flip back to her like they’ve forgotten she was there. Very interesting. She’s never seen Oliver like this, and she’s surprised by the easy jokes about his sleeping patterns, since she tries not to think about how disturbed his sleep has been since he returned and she is pretty sure he did too. Actually, now that she looks at him, he looks more well rested than she’s seen him since the first night he came home. “How exactly did you two meet?”

Oliver and Felicity tell the same story they told Walter. Thea chimes in a few times to make fun of Oliver’s lack of pop culture knowledge and she and Felicity trade a few jokes about his non-understanding of Twitter. The conversation hits a polite, but easy lull primarily because Moira seems content to observe them for now.

Oliver excuses himself to get refills of his and Felicity’s drinks, after a quick glance at Felicity that leaving her alone with his mother was alright—something Moira notices even as she declines another drink herself.

Moira watches as Felicity eats the remaining crackers on her plate, thinking over Oliver’s behavior the few times she spotted him the past few days, as in the few days since he and Felicity say they got together. She had noticed a difference in him and had planned to find out what was going on after this gala. It looks like she wouldn’t have to after all.

“It’s wonderful to see him smiling again. I think he has more in the past week than the rest of the time he’s been back,” Moira says and then glances at Felicity, to see if she understands what Moira is implying.

Felicity’s eyes don’t leave Oliver by the bar, waiting on their drinks and teasing his sister about not being old enough to have anything. “Oliver deserves to be happy, especially after everything he’s been through.”

“Yes, he does.” Felicity doesn’t seem follow, doesn’t realize that Moira knows Felicity is a big part of why Oliver seems so happy at this event, like a burden she didn’t realize he’d been carrying has been lifted. She tries again, fishing to see if they are as close as they seem to be, “Oliver doesn’t talk about what happened, but it was very difficult for him.”

Felicity nods, clearly still lost in her own thoughts. “It’s hard for him talk about, primarily due to the buckets of survivor’s guilt and PTSD he has.” Moira’s eyebrows raise at the blunt assessment of her son’s condition although she can’t help but agree. Felicity shakes her head, “He won’t listen to me when I tell him to talk to a psychiatrist—someone who can help more than I can.”

Moira reads between those lines easily, “He talks to you about his time on the island?” Since meeting Felicity, it’s the first time she’s truly been shocked. Oliver refuses, point blank, to talk about the island and what he went through with her or Thea—even Tommy from what she overheard. But he talks to this woman he’s only known a few months, but never mentioned before they suddenly started dating. Something is missing, Moira can almost see the absence of the piece that would make this make sense.

“I…” Felicity seems to realize she’s speaking aloud and who she’s speaking to. A mildly guilty look flashes over her face. “Yes, he does. It helps that I …” she cuts herself off and changes tracks. “We talk about lots of things, Lian Yu included.” Felicity gives a little shrug. “He’s not good at hiding things from me and I know when to back off. He listens to me too.”

They’re partners, Moira realizes, and that’s not something that happens over the course of a week. She’s fairly certain they couldn’t have accomplished going from strangers to this level of synchronicity in months. How else could they get to this place of mutual trust and understanding?

She thinks over Oliver’s behavior since he got back, trying to find anything else out of place or odd and suddenly it clicks. She sucks in a short breath, Felicity’s eyes widening in concern. Then she schools her face quickly and manages to say, “Thank you.”

“For what?” Felicity looks bewildered.

“For being there for him, when we couldn’t,” Moira fixes her with an intense look and it’s not hard for Felicity to follow along, the level of gratitude isn’t for a friend since he returned. She’s figured out what they really are to each other.

“Oh, I, um,” Felicity has no idea how to respond, they never thought anyone would find out. She takes a deep breath and sees nothing in Moira’s eyes but gratitude so she smiles, “Yeah, I’d do it again, in a heartbeat.”

When Oliver rejoins them, his mother only sticks around for an extra minute or so before she lets herself get pulled away by another attendee.

“What’s with the face?” Oliver asks, once they’re alone—noting the odd look on Felicity’s face. “Did my mom say something?”

“I think I just got her approval,” Felicity replies, still rather shocked by the idea.

“Of course,” Oliver says with a smile that says he’s laying it on thick on purpose but also still means what he’s saying. “How could you not?”

Felicity rolls her eyes, “You’re just biased.”

Oliver leans down to give her a brief kiss, “Maybe.”

“Definitely biased,” Felicity murmurs as she leans up for another kiss, finally relaxing and letting the contentment she usually feels around Oliver settle. Maybe this party hasn’t been such a bad idea after all.

**> >\-----> Bonus: Mama Smoak Edition >>\----->**

“Hi mom,” Felicity says, adjusting her glasses and regretting her decision not to get coffee yet. She’d just been meaning to check something on her computer before going back to bed when she got an incoming skype call from her mom. Feeling guilty about how often she blows her mom off, Felicity had reluctantly answered.

“Felicity!” Donna looks far too cheery for early Sunday morning, meaning she probably had an overnight shift. “I was starting to think I’d been doing this wrong the past few times since you never answered.”

“Sorry,” Felicity says, flinching. “Work was a little crazy. Projects, you know?” Before she’d been too busy trying to find Oliver claiming it was work projects to talk to her mom and after he got home, she’d actually thrown herself into work projects to distract herself from the knowledge that he was so close.

Donna Smoak sighs, “So you’ve been saying since you got that job. Before that it was working on your coursework. It’s always one thing after another and I get that your work is important to you, but I wish I got to see more of you.”

“You’re important to me too. Really,” Felicity pleads, she never meant to ignore her mom so much, it was just…easier. She shakes her head because Smoak woman don’t make excuses, they move forward. “I promise I’ll do better. My, um, long distance project actually finished, so I have some more free time again. Sorry I’ve been so MIA these past… Sorry.”

“It’s okay, sweetie,” Donna says. “It just worries me that you’re working yourself to death.”

“I know,” Felicity acknowledges. “But I don’t plan on taking on such a big project again.”

She lets her mom chatter away about her work friends while Felicity subtly checks her email and wonders when she can make an excuse to end the call. It’s just that she has other Sunday morning plans, ones that definitely don’t involve her mother, not matter how guilty she feels.

“Felicity?” Oliver’s voice comes from her bedroom and she twitches towards the sound before her eyes dart back to her mother’s. Did she hear that?

“Felicity,” Oliver calls again, closer and louder this time. “Come back to bed—it’s too early.” Felicity winces because yeah, her mom heard that, if the slightly slack jawed expression spreading across her face at the indication her perpetually single daughter had a man stay overnight is anything to go by.

Felicity finds her mouth opening, but no words come out for once. She hadn’t planned for this to happen, because, well, she’d tried not to think about this at all, if she was being honest. Even when she thought her and Oliver might be an in-person experience, those thoughts never really extended to him meeting her mother.

She turns in her chair and sees Oliver, wearing only his sweatpants, in the doorframe of her home office. Her breath catches a little at the picture he paints, at the reality of the situation that still catches her off guard.

He smiles before coming over and presses a sleepy kiss to the top of her head. “Felicity, are you working?” He’s actually pouting and definitely not paying any attention to the screen. His still slightly sleep rough voice does things to her insides that distract her from her mom as she thinks back to how she’d been planning on waking him up.

Donna, in particular, is struck by the very muscular chest that’s come into view behind her daughter and the voice of a man who has definitely slept over.

“It’s the weekend and you promised you wouldn’t work today.” Oliver plants kisses down her neck, wrapping his arms around her waist and her desk chair, trying to persuade her to go back with him to her bedroom.

It’s enough to jolt Felicity into awareness as she tenses in his arms. Faintly she says, “I just wanted to check something and then I got a call…” she gestures at the screen and Oliver leans down enough to see the Skype window open.

Oliver pulls back a bit and stares at the screen. “Oh! Hi?” he says automatically, recognizing her mother from years ago. Smoak women must have good genes because she does not look a decade older, even though she must be.

“Mom,” Felicity says, taking a deep breath. “This is my boyfriend, Oliver.”

Oliver smiles at the wide-eyed face of Felicity’s mom. “Very nice to finally meet you, Ms. Smoak.”

Donna pulls herself together enough to wave, a smile that looks nearly painful, it’s so bright spreading across her face, “So nice to meet you too, but please call me Donna.”

“Of course,” Oliver replies with an honest-to-god grin that makes Felicity lightly hit his chest just on principle. “Sorry for interrupting your conversation.” He presses a kiss to Felicity’s cheek, ignoring the way Donna sighs at the gesture. “How about I go make us some pancakes?”

Food is enough to distract Felicity from her panic. She looks up at him with hopeful eyes, “Blueberry?”

“Sure.” Oliver presses a quick kiss to her lips before heading out of view of the webcam.

“Um,” Felicity says when she turns back to her mother who is clearly struggling with the urge to hug her through the screen.

“How did—When did—A boyfriend?” Donna clearly has no idea where to start her inquisition. “Are you dating _Oliver Queen_?! And just when did you plan on telling me?!”

“Mo-om,” Felicity protests.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for sticking around with me on this story and for your encouraging comments and kudos!
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it! Please let me know what you thought!!


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